


Hetalia: Small World!

by conetsu



Category: Hetalia - Fandom, Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Anime, Brothers America & Canada (Hetalia), Brothers Germany & Prussia (Hetalia), F/M, Family, Family Bonding, Family Fluff, Fluff, Hetalia, Hetalia Countries Using Human Names, Human & Country Names Used (Hetalia), M/M, Manga & Anime, Multiple Relationships, Narrative, Updating, World Meeting (Hetalia), gratification, self gratification
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-05
Updated: 2020-06-30
Packaged: 2021-03-03 18:54:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 42,710
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24550405
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/conetsu/pseuds/conetsu
Summary: Student loans are already stressful enough! Add to the fact that the truth about your very existence is that you are actually a personification of states and life gets a little more hectic than it already should be. Well, at least things can't get any more complicated! Or can they?
Relationships: America/OC, Denmark/OC, England/OC, Germany/OC, South Italy/Spain (Hetalia), Spamano
Kudos: 3





	1. Get to know the Characters! Or not, idk.

Olivia’s POV

I leaned back to look at Mr. Gloch, my guidance counselor, in the eyes. He ran one tan hand through his salt-pepper hair, while the other stayed in front of him, holding unto my student file. I saw his eyes scan the document before looking me in the eyes. I looked back at his eyes and saw the smile line turn upward. We both stood up at the same time, and he moved to cup both of my hands into his own. “Well, Miss Dubuose, I believe you have the credentials to get into these schools, though I really wish you had a fail safe.”

I smiled at Mr. Gloch and shook his clasped hands, which held my own. I leaned forward and said, “I don’t plan on giving up, sir.” He guffawed, beer belly shaking a bit as he leaned back on his chair. “I’m just trying to help you,” he said mirthfully, eyes twinkling. “I’m not suggesting that you’ll fail.” I grinned, picking up my bag and folder. Heading towards the door, I turned to Mr. Gloch and said, 

“I know sir, I’m just joking. I didn’t mean to sound condescending, but I’m set on those schools.”

“You’re really serious about becoming a firefighter?”

I paused at that statement. He must’ve seen that I faltered at my exit, because he stood up quickly and moved towards me. I put my hand up, and turned my body towards me. He stopped short. “Ah... I don’t take offense to that, sir.” I reassured him, and his shoulders relaxed. “I aspire to be like my mom, and she went to the HetaliU firefighter academy. Which is why I chose those schools. It’s my belief that I need to protect my country, and I feel like that I’m one step closer to that.” I said, looking him square in the eyes. 

He eyed me, not in a lecherous way, but it sent a slight still in my spine. Mr. Gloch was an ex-military man, at least that’s what Mirai found out by hacking the system, when his answer of “My previous job was a security guard, nothing special.” during his introductory speech about 2 years ago. My friends and I told her to leave it alone because she would get in trouble, but she paid no mind. 

She got in trouble but not arrested, thank god Mr. Gloch appreciated the initiative. “Good, people aren’t going to give you much trouble if you keep that up.” he had told her. And we liked to talk to him ever since, especially me, since I’ve only heard about the cases my mom took through my next-door neighbor Mrs. Dubuose, who was a friend of my mom, and who graciously took me in after she died 11 years ago in a warehouse fire. So I got my fix from Mr. Gloch, who told me about his military training. It wasn’t related to firefighting at all, but hearing his tales of training got me psyched up for my future. Every time I exited his office, I always had the itch to work out. Which I did. Then gave up because I got too hungry to continue.

I squared up to him, and he nodded, satisfied with the look on my face. “Well,” he said, picking up the rest of my file and walking towards the filing cabinet, “either way, I know that whether you get accepted or not is not an issue here. As long as you keep being yourself, you’ll find a way to squeeze yourself in that industry, one way or another.” I looked at him with an eyebrow raised. He gave me a playful wink and ushered me out the door, “Fate’s a kooky goddess, trust me, kid.” I nodded, still unsure about what he was talking about, but I smiled back at him, finding his usual quote funny. 

“Oh, and one more thing Miss Dubuose?” 

“Yes, sir?”

“Don’t forget to secure your insurance, and make sure you can get those loans as early as this Saturday. I don’t want you to miss any of the necessary payments before you graduate.”

I smiled. “Thank you sir. And I won’t.” He smiled back. “Have a great day, Miss Dubuose. And don’t forget what I told you.”

Waiting for graduation is always a listless time. Either you’re working your ass off to get the cash to move out, or you’re furiously planning for your senior prom. I didn’t really need to get a job because of my mom’s connections and kind Mrs. Dubuose. And I wasn’t interested in prom because I wasn’t popular. Sure, I could still go, but prom has a lot of drama for some reason, and well, I’m not into that. However, I was interested in one thing.

Senior Pranks.

I don’t remember who brought the idea up, whether it was Marina or I but we somehow managed to rope in Emilie and Mirai into the plan. The plan in question was to go up to every house in Pomodoro County (really small town, population estimate approximately 1,470), and leave glitter boxes on the porches of the kids of the graduating class, and the teachers. It would blow up in their faces, leaving them glitter-fied from head to foot. We planned to do it this Sunday, knowing that every graduating kid would be stalking behind their front doors, waiting for either their college acceptance letters, last paycheck or loan acceptance letter, and make some dumb excuse not to go to their place of worship. 

Of course I was one of those kids, but I’m definitely not falling for that prank. 

I walked the almost empty hall. School had let out a couple of minutes ago, but I knew better. I walked towards the side door, towards the school vending machines and got 2 sodas and 2 waters. I walked out the side door that led to the auditorium and entered. The banner of our school mascot, a crimson cow, hung above my head, and I saw a variety of sports teams practicing for the finals for the season end. I walked over to one of the clubs, the kendo club. Mirai was there as usual, practicing ever so diligently. She’s probably the only nerd from the coding club to join a sports team. I walked over to her as she finished, and put down the wooden dummy sword. She took the towel off her neck to wipe the perspiration from her forehead. “Sup.” I said, throwing to her one of the bottles. She caught it and took a huge glug, and capped it. Out of breath she nodded, tilting her head to the side towards the benches, where I turned and saw my friends, waiting and talking. I made my way over there, picking up on the last of Marina’s conversation. “...and it didn’t turn out so well- Oh hey!” She raised her hand and I gave her a soft high-five, taking her hand and giving her the water she asked me to get. I climbed my way up to the plank above where my two friends were sitting and plopped down. I placed one can of soda atop Emilie’s head, and waited for her to get it from me. 

“So, we all set for this Sunday?” I asked them in a low voice, popping the can and taking a swig. “Yeah, I got a shit ton of glitter ready and waiting.” Marina answered, grinning at me and giving me a thumbs up. “And I’ve got the boxes ready.” Emilie said, also taking a swig. “I honestly hope we can wreck a bit of havoc before we graduate. It will be fun.” I grinned back at her. “I know.” Mirai made her way over to us, towel around her neck and bags galore full of her club stuff. “Ready to go?” she said, still red around the neck. We gathered our things and made our way towards the entrance of school, planning the final touches for Sunday. I also told them how my counseling session went, and pondered what Mr. Gloch’s final words to me meant.

“He might just be trying to assure you.” Mirai said, patting my shoulder, as she stood beside me. All four of us exited the premises. Many other kids followed out the door, some walking, some running to their parents waiting outside in their cars. “After all, you only had 2 choice schools.” I shrugged. That statement didn’t seem like the correct answer. 

“Well, either way there’s something else I want to ask, Marina?”

Said girl turned towards me. “Hm?”

“I saw you outside the principal’s office.”

Marina shrugged. “Eh, well, I got in trouble-” “Again.” Emilie interjected, snorting. 

“Hey, I got a good reason for beating her up.”

“Beating who up?” I asked, raising an eyebrow to Marina. ‘Really?’ I silently asked, almost glaring at her. Marina tsked, making a face. “Well, that bitch Charlotte told me that she thinks the only reason why I chose colleges all the way in D.C was because I got dumped and that I was pathetic for doing so.”

“And then?”

“And then Marina said well you know what’s more pathetic? Creating a tiktok about fake friends when you yourself are one.” Emilie stated again, rolling her eyes. “Though that isn’t what made her throw the first punch.” I sighed. “And then what?” Marina glared at Emilie before finishing.

“She told me that I couldn’t amount to anything because I don’t try hard enough.” Marina tightened her fist. “I sure tried hard on that punch though.” I sighed, chuckling a little. “That Charlotte is a bitch, but you haven’t been in the office in, like, the 4th grade. C’mon.” Marina shrugged laughing. “Should’ve seen the look on the principal’s face, ‘I haven’t had a misfit like you in my office since eight years ago, did you beat someone up again, child?’” I laughed a bit, looking back on my previous misconducts as well. Good thing I grew out of it, eventually. And I’m glad that the principal didn’t suspend her before graduation because the teacher warned Charlotte if she kept her behavior up, Marina was for sure to punch her for that. 

Most of the town was made up of ex-veterans so all their kids are either super buff or super knowledgeable in throwing a proper punch, though there are some families that just moved here for the quiet nature of our town, like Charlotte and Emilie’s family. Everyone else like me, Marina, and Mirai, were born and raised here. So it’s pretty common knowledge not to fight anyone in this town, or else you’ll get your ass kicked by someone, one way or another. 

My mom told me that her family used to live here, but moved to New York for the bigger academies, especially for their firefighter crazy daughter. That was when this town only consisted of 500 people. Once it got bigger, some of her relatives moved back here, and eventually she did too when my dad died and she was pregnant with me. The town caters more to ex-veterans, but obviously everyone is welcome. Other than my family, Marina’s and Mirai’s families are also not war veterans, but they had relatives that were. Marina’s family is one the biggest produce farmers around here. Their cherry tomatoes are almost as sweet as grapes, and their tomato sauce is to die for. Marina’s usual comment to me is “It’s tomato sauce or bust, bitch.” That’s one of the many things we disagree on, but we’re still best friends. Mirai’s family is filled with a bunch of technical wizes borne from machine makers of the war era. She had a small obsession with tinkering with old Japanese cars before deviating and deciding to try her hand at coding and hacking. She loved it from the first 101 script. Her sister, who is her guardian, is super proud of her because she was apparently the desk lady at the Pentagon. Or so Mirai says. And like I said, Emilie moved here a few years ago with her uncle. This was an up-and-coming town, and the people here wanted a decent bakery and not just a bread distributor. They wanted actual confectionary treats. Her and her uncle were happy to provide that in cakes, donuts and waffles. Yeah, that’s right. Waffles. You could say that’s Emilie’s speciality, making the crunchy but soft breakfast treat. Waffles are better than pancakes, and nothing but berries or chocolate, but preferably chocolate, is the only acceptable topping. And she will most likely stab you if you try to eat it with a fork and knife. “You’re ruining it!” she had lamented loudly when I was offered them before. 

Speaking of lamenting....

Emilie huffed visibly for the third time during the whole walk home. I gave her a look, and then looked at Mirai, who looked back at me and gave an apologetic smile. “6th period, Ms. Bronte again. Took her sugar sachets as well.” she explained, while rubbing Emilie’s shoulders in an effort to calm her down. “And she woke me up!” Emilie exclaimed, throwing her hands in the air. I shuddered. If there’s two things you shouldn’t do to Emilie, never deprive her of pure sugar, and never wake her up without a good reason. Those two rules were broken today by the greatest bitch I ever did have the pleasure in attending her classes.

Ms. Bronte was the literature teacher, who absolutely hated when kids fell asleep in her class. Which is pretty often because of the amount of papers she makes us write, that can make us stay awake until 3am. Emilie falls asleep in class all the time, to the point where she’s brought her own pillow to school, but can be woken up to answer any questions, with surprising genius, only to fall asleep again. I guess Ms. Bronte’s class was no exception. I gave Emilie the emergency sachets of sugar I stashed away in my bag, to which she grabbed them from me and ripped them open, pouring the contents into her mouth. 

“You are a lifesaver. Seriously how much shit is in your bag anyway?”

I grinned. “I always come prepared for anything. Scout’s code.” Mirai snorted. “Apparently the Scout’s code includes a crowbar and duck tape as well.”

“Hey, I didn’t hear any complaints when that Buchanan boy discarded a used condom into the computer unit after the theatre club’s Friday Night performance.”

Mirai winced at the horrible memory. The coding club didn’t let the infamy from that incident die down. There was too much of the stuff, and too little time and money to throw the unit away in the trash. The rest of the parts were salvageable, albeit a little sticky. Thankfully, I didn’t have to use up all of my volunteer time at the theatre club that night to help Mirai, who had also been volunteering as a technical stagehand, to get rid of the thing, and wipe the unit down thoroughly. Unfortunately, she still had to explain what had happened to the unit Monday morning to her seniors. I had slung the remaining bits to Buchanan in his face after the show, during the cast party. Let’s just say his reputation with his “girlfriends” and his integrity were ruined that night. 

“I know you’re always prepared,” Emilie said, stuffing the wrappers in her pockets. “but you even have a hand umbrella.”

“So?” I looked at her strangely, and she looked back at me in awe. “It doesn’t rain here!” she exclaimed, throwing her hands up. She retracted a bit because the branches from the nearby bushes pricked her. That signaled to us that we were in our neighborhood. 

“And even if it does, we’re literally ten minutes away from our houses. You don’t ever need your umbrella ever. It takes up too much space that could be used for better things.”

“Yeah, but she won’t have her red flag anymore.” Interjected Mirai, who turned to grin at me. I turned red and looked away. “I-it’s not like that....”

“You surrrreeee~?” Mirai purred, sidling up to me, shoulder to shoulder.

“Yes!” I turned to her, red in the face. 

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Emilie asked again. Marina snickered and I glared at her, silently telling her not to explain but she did anyway. “A red flag is a term used in dating sims for moments that are triggered by specific requirements.” She pointed at me grinning like a Cheshire cat. “And her bringing around an umbrella is one red flag.”

Emilie ‘ooooh’d’ at me, grinning just as widely, as I just turned away, fiddling the straps of my bag, embarrassed as all hell. “You and a boy, underneath your umbrella, shoulder to shoulder! You say, “Aren’t you getting wet?” and he hits back at you with that, “As long as you stay under this umbrella with me, I’ll keep you dry~” Emilie exclaimed in a singsong voice, extending her arms in a theatrical way. 

I covered my face in my hands. “You’re embarrassing me.” I murmured. “We love you bro.” Marina snickered. “You’re just a romantic at heart, but you won’t admit that.”

“You’re also dense as fuck.” Shot Mirai.

“And you don’t talk to boys, like at all.” Emilie mentioned.

“Yeah, I know, I know! We weren’t talking about my non-existent love life in the first place so cut it out.” I exclaimed, waving my hands. I stood outside my house. Sometimes being the first friend in a group to separate from the group when going home is a good thing. “We’re here anyways, so good-bye!”

“See ya!”

“Message you later, ‘bout the stuff.”

“Send me that file from Ms. Norris later, please!”

“Yes, yes of course.” I said, waving my friends goodbye. I watched their backs disappear around the first block from my house, then I walked towards the familiar red brick house I’ve grown accustomed to since childhood. It looked like something straight out of the three little pigs story, except the third piglet was a certified gun-wielding grandma (but she doesn’t keep a gun at home, so don’t worry).

Mrs. Rose Dubuose is the widow that’s taking care of me. Though you wouldn’t know she was one. I suppose “milf” might be an appropriate term, but I feel personally disgusted if anyone, myself included, uses it. Rose likes calling herself that and for good reason. She’s regarded by our tight-knit community as “Pomodoro’s Siren”. Even at 60, she still looks like she’ll beat the crap at you. She has toned arm and leg muscles, despite the slightly hunched back and small stature of five foot stone, and the softest hands you ever did feel. You wouldn’t guess she loves hard labor like gardening and was once the president of a security company. Along with her late-wife, she did jobs that included the rich and famous. Even got jobs from the White House executives, she told me once. And I believe her, for Rose doesn’t lie. Look into her bright brown eyes, she would tell me, and I would know; No bullshit. 

“Aunty, I’m home!” I announced at the front entrance, as I closed the door behind me. I saw her big pink curly hair first, before noticing she was carrying a tray and a half of freshly washed vegetables. I dropped my bags and walked quickly over to her, taking the other tray from her hand. “Hey baby, how are you? I could hear you from my garden.” she greeted me with that million dollar smile. “Must’ve had fun at school?” I smiled widely back at her. “Sure did, aunty. Got my clearance ready. Just have to check up on my loan tomorrow.” I answered, placing the rest of the vegetables on the kitchen island. She walked over and gave me a forehead kiss, bringing my head closer to her lips by placing her hand on the back of my head.

“I’m proud of you baby. Wish your mama was still here to see you go off to the big city.”

I smiled down at her wistfully, not saying anything. There wasn’t much to be said about my mom. I knew she would be proud because I would be going back to New York and start my career as a firefighter myself. Just like she did when she was my age. And I would be bringing a part of her with me. “I’ll be bringing a part of her with me, so I know I’ll be fine.” I put a hand on Rose’s shoulder. “Didn’t forget about you either.” Rose guffawed, a laugh that sounded like pure joy, and she smacked my upper arm. “Course you will! I will not permit you to forget about me, child!” she exclaimed, grabbing a kitchen knife and cutting board, starting to get to work on her vegetables for dinner. 

“How could I forget about you, aunty?”

“You’d be surprised about the things you forget with distance and time.”

I paused a bit at that. The words Mr. Gloch rang through my ears. 

“As long as you keep being yourself, you’ll find a way to squeeze yourself in that industry, one way or another.” 

“Aunty?” I asked, starting to chop the spinach. Grabbing a colander and dumping my work into there, I got a carrot and started on that. “Mr. Gloch said something to me before I left.”

“It ain’t inappropriate, I would hope.”

“No ma’am.” I reassured her, and then relayed to her what he had told me. When I finished I turned to look at her and weirdly, she was just staring at her work. Usually she’d be singing praises about how well she did or how simply delicious her meal would turn out tonight, but she just stared quietly at the chopped veggies. I stared at her for a really long time, trying to figure out what I said wrong. She finally looked up at me and said, “Baby, you know I can’t say don’t mind that man’s weird ass proverbs, but that would be lying to you, and I don’t want to do that to you.” I raised an eyebrow, glancing back and forth between her and cleaning up the veggies that wouldn’t make it in aunty’s dinner meal. “What do you mean? Am I- are we in trouble or something?”

She shook her head, smiling warmly. “Naw, hun. Just the past coming to say hello.”

I looked at her, bewildered. “How far back in the past?” She sucked in and breathed out hard. “Hoo, very, very far back. So far back, that I wasn’t born yet.” My eyes widened. ‘What the fuck is going on?’

We didn’t say anything to each other during the meal preparation or dinner. But before I went upstairs to collect my thoughts, she stopped me by holding out her arms. I hugged her hard. “I don’t understand, Rose. Why so damn cryptic?” I murmured into her shoulder. I felt her smile and she patted my back, like she did when I came to her in the middle of the night when I had a nightmare. “It seems cliche to tell you this, but it’s to protect you.” She pulled away, and I looked into those god-fearing eyes.

And I saw nothing but the truth.

She licked her lips and stared into my eyes. “I’m saying as much as I can. I’ll explain what I mean tomorrow.” I smiled. “Ok, Rose. I trust you.” She winked, “That’s a promise!”, and turned around to walk to the couch. I looked at my wristwatch and hurried up quickly to my room, just as I was hearing the opening theme song of Rose’s favorite show. 

I quickly changed and plugged my phone into the charger. Hopping into bed, I heard a familiar ping. I picked up my phone and looked at the screen. A text message had just popped up. It was from Emilie.

“Is it just me, or are people being really fucking shady right now?”

“You too huh? What did Uncle Lucas say?”

“Well, since I’m also applying for a loan, damn corporate rats-” I snickered at this and turned over on my side. “-I told him I was going with you guys to the place tomorrow. And he told me he had to tell me something tomorrow, after I got the necessary paperwork.” That’s weird. Uncle Lucas’ first language isn’t English. He’s Dutch, specifically Belgian, as he was so fond of showing off said flag everywhere. He had a ton of Belgian paraphernalia. He and Emilie usually speak in Dutch, but to hear him wanting to speak to her, and it seemed so serious, he doesn’t talk to her in English unless it was super serious. So I was more concerned than confused. I grinned.

“Is this an attempt to make you stop sleeping in high school before you start doing that in college classes?”

“You know I’m probably still going to do that in college, but that’s not my point.”

“You’re right. Though I know I probably can’t contact Marina or Mirai until tomorrow?”

“Both have dead phones?”

“Yep.”

“Typical. Anyway, let’s bring this up, just in case they also had a weird, cryptic experience.”

“Yeah, sure.”

“Anyways, I’m gonna finish Ms. Bronte’s damn paper. I’ll see you tomorrow Olly.”

“Of course. Pretty sure this can’t get weirder, right?”

In hindsight, I wish I knew my friends and I were going to be in the wildest rides that I’ve ever experienced. But I knew one thing was for certain; They were better than any ride I could ever imagine.


	2. I prepared for every possible scenario when I was going to the loan office. I did not know I needed to prepare for a life change as well.

Chapter 2 

Mirai’s POV

“Mirai-chan! It’s time to get up for Saturday calisthenics~!” I woke up blearily, rubbing the sleep from my eyes as I heard a woman call my name from downstairs. The morning light already streamed through my room. ‘Lilian must’ve opened the curtains earlier...’ I thought to myself as I slowly got out of bed. Still in my pajamas, I made my way downstairs to join her. Lilian Kouchou is my sister, or at least that’s what I assumed for the longest time. We look nothing alike; she had thick dark brown hair that she dyed to blonde a few years ago, green eyes and fair skin, whilst I have thin jet black hair and grey eyes.

I made my way downstairs into the living room to join my sister with our Saturday morning routine, before she headed off to work.

I suspected my sister was not my actual sister a few days ago when she let something slip. I had gotten my confirmation from Mr. Gloch a few days ago, so I had told my sister ahead of time that I was going with my friends to settle our payments together so we could hang out in the process. She and I were driving back home from school since I came out late due to my club.

"Oh you're going with your friends to find out the big news, huh?" she mused, shifting the car unto drive once she saw the stoplight going green. I looked at her strangely. "Well, finding out if you paid the necessary payments isn't exactly 'big news' but I guess you can consider it as that." I answered her. A pause of, what I considered at the time, nervous energy that emanated from my sister before changing the subject completely was the first sign.

The second sign that I had taken into consideration when rethinking our relationship was when I asked what date our dad was coming for my graduation, and she couldn't give me a straight answer. "Oh you know, he's super busy! So he might arrive late and might not come in time for the ceremony! " she managed to blurt out, flustering incessantly.

She had told me when I was young that she was 25 when our dad left for Japan to pursue his career in game development, something which I told my friends repeatedly that I would do; follow in his footsteps to make the next big game. I had assigned myself to that lifestyle and although I spoke well enough Japanese, I thought it might not be enough for a university in Japan itself, so I settled for something closer to home, and to my friends. Mostly for my friends. She also told me that she had been taking care of me while she was doing her job at the Pentagon, which by all accounts of my research turned out to be legit. There is a Lilian Kouchou who works for the Pentagon in a pretty legit computer science field.

But these two inconsistencies at that moment left me wondering why my sister was being so flighty about my dad and her comment, so I decided to do my own research. Not exactly in her work, but another aspect of her work. It seemed that, aside from the pretty sweet desk job, she was also a certified safe house agent. Meaning she also housed people who were in danger or were a state secret or something. And according to the records, the house I’m in right now is considered a safe house that’s been occupied for 11 years. I was neither a state secret nor a fugitive running away. At least not to my knowledge. Further research also revealed to me that a lot more people in our town were either retired, or active agents from the Pentagon, Mrs. Dubuose, Olivia's guardian, was one of the retired safe house agents. Marina's parents, Maya and Leonardo Diaz, were active undercover agents in the Pentagon. Their status said 'active mission' and the issuance date of the mission they were on was on the 8th of August, 11 years ago. Others such as Uncle Lucas Dupont, Emilie's guardian, was a security agent for international affairs in Belgium. His status also said he was on an active mission with an issuance date of 11 years ago, but on a different date.

After 2 days of sleepless nights doing both my personal and school research, I had come to the conclusion that either of the two reasons might be the case and I would find out when I would go to register for my loan payment. This is because I need a social security card to be able to do the loan payment, and I don't have one. My sister didn't hold one for me in my name either and told me before that I "didn't have to worry about that" when I had tried to apply for a job one time and they told me that I needed that card to apply. I ended up not applying for that job, but I was so confused about that situation. So confused that I had asked my friends about it and they responded in the same way, which furthered my confusion.

All these inconsistencies left me wondering big time. Why did I nor either of my friends not have a social security card? Why did we not need it? And why was it important for all of us to receive big news on Saturday? Not having a social security card meant that, most likely, my friends and I would be brought into questioning. Not having that card meant that either we were illegal aliens or our identities were fake and we would likely be arrested and or charged with a felony. We were legal adults after all.

I had a hard time wrapping my head around the so-called truth but any other rational thought didn't make sense. Thus I didn't have the heart to tell my friends what I had found out. I don't think I could've explained it to them properly, and if I did they would just deny it because they didn't know any better. It wouldn't be wrong; that kind of reaction would be natural. I don't think I know how to handle people in denial. In situations like this, I really wished I was Marina or Olivia, for they would probably have a better explanation for this, instead of just research via hacking and fantastical presumptions. Not that research by hacking is illegitimate, it's just hard to prove by the normal Google search. This isn’t a movie or anime, after all.

In any case, these were all just presumptions based on my research and though I thought to myself that I shouldn't get ahead of myself due to the fantastical nature of my inner claims, I was certain of one conclusion: I'm not related to the woman who was dancing to some Eastern sounding music while some high pitched dude shouting cheers in Japanese, whilst flapping her arms rapidly. And though I know she isn't my sister, I still feel at kin with her. I always related to Japanese customs better than Americans, and certainly better than my friends. So even if I find out that she isn't my sister, I don't think that would be a point of contention between us. Rather I think that it would bring us closer. Lilian's lived in Japan before, so maybe I could find my real parents with her... I wonder if dad knows more...

I scratched my head. 'Arrrgghhh! I'm getting ahead of myself!'

"You should shower before you leave so that you don't feel so itchy."

I turned to look at my sister, who had a look of concern in her eyes. I looked at the TV screen and Lilian voiced my thoughts. "The calisthenics have been over for a few minutes now, and you've been spacing out since the beginning. Are you still sleepy?" I shook my head and looked at her. Then went over and gave her a big hug. She called out in surprise, but started to massage my head.

"Ahh, nee-nee that feels nice~" I murmured, content. She laughed in the way that rich anime characters did, which I and my friends found hilarious. "Fu fu fu~ Well, if you had any worries today, it will all go away right now!" To me, that phrase was silly, but I'd be lying if I didn't say that made me feel better. I looked up at her and she smiled down at me in a motherly way.

Oh yeah. Definitely not my sister. I'm too fucking short and certainly not as busty as her. God I sound like an old perv.

"I'm gonna have a bath and get dressed, Lilian-nee." I announced after pulling away from her, still holding unto her forearms. She shook her head and made a 'tsk-tsk' sound. "Eat first. That's the most important thing. Miso soup and white rice to start the day. C'mon, before it gets cold." I nodded excitedly and joined her at the breakfast bar.

I love my sister's cooking. Especially when she cooks Japanese breakfast. I can feel my Japanese DNA sing!

I got dressed and grabbed my bag containing my stuff: phone, wallet, bus card, cord, portable charger, foldable wooden katana, mini screwdriver set, and hand sanitizer. As well as, of course, the necessary documents I needed to get my loans. Or at least try to. I wasn’t as hoarders, girl scout crazy as Olivia, but I come prepared in my own way. And yes, the foldable wooden katana does come in handy, and yes I have a license for it, since it’s considered a lethal weapon, just like those police batons. One of the perks of being a member of the kendo club. I couldn’t leave right away because my sister insisted that my hair be dried first, and she even let me take her polished wooden comb with me, just in case my picture had to be taken. I stepped out of my house after my hair was dry, bade my sister farewell, and walked to the bus stop, where I just about saw the outlines of my friends. 

Olivia noticed me first, waving ecstatically, since she’s always secretly worried about us. I tease her about it, and say that she watches way too much crime drama, but every time I say it, she gets prickly about it. Such a tsundere. 

And another thing, we’re just getting (or trying to, how many times do I have to preface this?) our loans, but she’s dressed like she’s about to have a meeting with Miranda Priestly. “Did you have to come dressed like this?” I said, gesturing to her outfit. Her blonde wisps blustered in the wind, including the little ahoge, as I called it, that was somehow connected to the center of her forehead, at her hairline. She pouted, blushing. “I- well- I just like this outfit. And besides,” She referred to her ahoge. “-it detracts every attention away from this stupid thing.” She sighed. “No matter how much gel or hairspray I use, it just won’t go down!” I snickered. Emilie removed her headphones from her ears, getting up, and greeting me with a hug before turning to face Olivia. “Ever thought of just chopping it off?” She asked. Olivia’s shoulders sagged at that. “Sure did.” She answered. “But Rose always catches me and scolds me like hell when I do.” Marina got up from the bus seat to survey Olivia’s hair as well. Her outfit was just as inappropriate for the task at hand, but at least she was wearing pants, and not her signature denim shorts, and an actual shirt, granted it was a pink, silk, spaghetti strap top, and not a damn bandana like in those tiktoks. Seriously, who came up with these ridiculous stints? There are actual clothes, people!

“Well,” Marina started. “It fits your outfit. But I gotta agree with Mirei, you ain’t in New York yet, don’t lie to yourself just yet!” Olivia huffed at her, cheeks puffing up, and turning red. “U-ugh, you sound just like Rose, dammit. She said the same thing to me, and I told her, well since it’s an important day today, I have to look nice!” We laughed at her because the thought was funny, we weren’t making fun of Olivia, it’s just how she operates on life and we love her for it. But deep down, I think they knew that today was important to them- heck, to us even, for some reason. I found out that each of us got a cryptic message, the night before today. I received a text from Emilie ranting how her uncle became serious, which shocked me, and even more so Marina’s parents, who are the most chill parents I’ve ever had the pleasure of meeting. To the point where her dad told her she looked “just swell” (according to Marina’s translation, they don’t speak English) in the bandana top. So to have her getting a sit down, in the living room, before bed, is super weird. 

The bus arrived and we stepped on. The bus wasn’t crowded, so we were able to sit near each other, Me and Emilie taking the two bus seats close to the doors, whilst Marina and Olivia decided to stand, in favor for the less able bodied individuals the bus will pick up on the way to the loan office. It was Saturday and the weather was nice, as I let myself stare out the window, letting Emilie sleep on my shoulder for the trip, earphones in her ear. Over the faint music that I could hear from Emilie’s earphones, I vaguely heard Marina and Olivia, mostly Olivia, talking about the math homework she wanted Marina to check, and Marina saying she hadn’t done it yet, to which Olivia lightly chided her, but not as loudly as usual. I don’t like conversing loudly on the bus, and my friends know that’s one of my pet peeves, so they usually converse quietly in between themselves, but I’m always included. 

I squinted to watch all the shops and houses pass by, and I couldn’t help but let my mind wander about the different scenarios that might occur to us while in the loan office. The first being arrested and thrown in jail. I have somewhat of a criminal record, and surprised that my hacking this week alone hasn’t incurred a raid by the FBI on my house. What was jail like? And what would we be charged with? The second scenario is faked identity. What would happen to my sister? Would they throw her in jail? Who’s gonna pick dad up from the airport? I can’t drive, and certainly not to the airport! The ceremony is in the morning! I wonder if we would be allowed to just live in our houses since we would be moving to our college cities in less than 2 weeks. That way I can ask Marina to help pick my dad up. She’s always late anyway, and she’s the first of us to get a car, which is cool. Oh gosh, what if we get deported? What if-

Violent shaking pulled me out of my reverie. I felt someone tug me and my bag out of the seat and walk me to the open bus door, the bus horn honking violently and as loudly as it can. “Thank you, Miss Violet!” Olivia shouted. The driver responded with a gruff head nod as she closed all the doors and sped away. Olivia looked at me with a mixture of both annoyance and amusement on her face. She hooked her arm around my arm and together we walked to the halfway point of the entrance to the loan office, where Marina and Emilie were waiting for us. “You ok?” Olivia asked me. I could see her other hand was resting on a water bottle. Ready and prepared, as always. “Do you feel hot or dizzy? I have meds for both, if you need it that is.” She added quickly, looking concerned. I grinned at her. “Aw, Olly! Thank you for caring!” I hugged her arm tighter and she tried to pry herself from my grasp. Her face of concern, turned to flustered anger. “H-hey! You! Next time don’t space out too much! And don’t lean on the glass next time, too! They’re unsanitary.” She scolded, to which I grinned wider. I let her go and ran towards Emilie, hiding behind her in mock fear, still smiling widely. “Waah~ Emilie, Olivia’s getting angry at me~!” 

“Oi.”

“Waahh~”

“Alright. C’mon. We’re here.” Marina said, opening the door for us to step through. The loan office was quiet. “Uh, is it just me, or is it a ghost town in here?” I heard Olivia whisper. She didn’t need to whisper, but it was just too quiet. I too had the urge to whisper, for some strange fear that I would rouse something I shouldn’t have. “And it’s a Saturday. It should be a market around this time too!” The loan office on weekdays only had two lanes open, since government offices around here were open and the requests that would come in on those days were done along with the requests from the weekend prior, which is when the four lanes in the office would be open. And that’s when the shouting, crying and arguing would arise, since the people who would turn in their requests that week would have to wait until Monday to find out whether their requests were accepted or rejected. Most people in Pomodoro know the process and are kind about it, but the loan office here accepts people from other counties. And people from other counties can get a bit hot-headed. 

The four open lanes sat under harsh, white fluorescent lights, making the tills look like mini interrogation cubbies, and the people manning them look like the bad cops in movies. And speaking of the people, they weren’t the usual middle-aged, Southern women that we were used to when we came here a few times during a weekend to people watch, snacking on 7-11 pizza, which Olivia thought were disgusting. No, they were grown men, looking about in their twenties or thirties, hard at work doing absolutely nothing, other than checking their phones and sending a text every once in a while, just like the ladies we’re used to, but even doing that made them intimidating. 

Olivia was the first to cut the silence with a cough. We turned to her and the men looked up slightly before going back to what they were doing. “Well,” she said, still speaking in a low tone. “Let’s take advantage of this, and get this over quickly.” Marina reached out and put a hand on her shoulder, pulling her inwards. Instinctively, Emilie and I also leaned forward. “Wait, before we do that, can I just say how fucking sketchy this is?” She whisper yelled, and I nodded at her words. “Super fucking sketchy. These dudes aren’t the ladies we’re used to.” Olivia glanced back quickly and then ducked back in a hushed tone. “I-well-what am I supposed to do?” she said. She scrubbed her face, a sign of anxious thinking. “Look,” she huffed, and she regarded us with her blue eyes, which were normally bright, but they had a slight darkness to them here. “If anything, and I mean anything happens, we have our code, and we can pay for damages later. Ok?”

“Got it.”

“Oi! You two can’t just agree blindly!” Emilie whisper-yelled. Marina and I looked at each other and then back at Emilie. “Well, what else are we supposed to do? Turn back? Wait until tomorrow?” Marina shot back.

“We only have today! Sunday is our senior prank day, Monday to Thursday’s our exams, Friday is our last club day and season’s end, and Saturday is graduation practice from 8am to 12pm, then right after that we have to help prep for the stupid prom because we aren’t going! And may I remind you that we’re graduating on Sunday and following that is our time as a group to pack up our things because we’re all moving away in different states?”

Emilie glared at her, then sighed. Throwing her hands up, she finally said, “Fine, but I’ll scream as loud as I can because I can’t fight like you guys.” Olivia smiled. “Of course. We aren’t going to leave you behind like that.” Marina nodded. “Duh, idiota.” she poked Emilie’s forehead and I grinned thinking about that one anime scene again. “Don’t do that.” Emilie = huffed before walking over to one of the tills. The man behind the counter stood up stiffly and shook her hand. They both sat down. While Emilie leaned back, the man brought himself forward, resting his bulging forearms on the table. I thought his shirt sleeves would rip. Olivia went to the next one beside Emilie, I followed Olivia to the next one, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw Marina take up the last till, cheerfully greeting the man behind the counter, to which the man responded back in an equally pleasant voice. 

“Hello there.” The man tasked to the till I was at greeted me. His voice was low and pleasant sounding, but I had my reservations. I silently handed him my file and my loan registration form. I caught unto his name tag before he retracted his arms into himself. It read “Stefan”. I looked at him as he pushed his reading glasses up to his face. His face definitely did not read as a “Stefan”. I heard Marina chatting amiably to the man in the till on my left, and on my right, I heard Olivia manage to stutter out as loud as she could, what she wanted to say. She was never really good with talking to people, unlike Marina or I, but had a voice as loud as stage director and could probably out yell a Japanese casino employee in a crowded casino in Shibuya, at least that’s what my sister told me when she heard Olivia practically shrieking when I annihilated her in Tekken one night when we were having a sleepover. 

“Ok so everything checks out pretty well.” Stefan said. “That’s good.” I replied curtly. He looked at me, then looked at the file again. “Game development in Heta-TechU in Los Angeles, California. Wow that’s pretty far.”

“Yes, sir. It is sir.”

“One of the best tech universities in the US of A. Pretty sweet choice, if I do say so myself. Pretty pricey too.”

“Yes, sir. So I’ve heard.”

“They’ve got pretty good tech universities in Tokyo too, if I recall.”

I blinked rapidly. “Excuse me?” He looked up from my file and smiled. That was genuine.

“Tokyo. Japan. They have good tech universities there too. I’m sure you’d be happy there too. You don’t have any trouble, language wise, and you’ve got pretty good connections, too.”

“Sir, I believe you’re overstepping your boundaries in this conversation.” I said, stiffening. I’m pretty sure that if anyone found out my sister’s job casually like this, then she might be in trouble with her superiors, or worse: targeted. Stefan stopped leafing through my file and looked at me, still smiling, still genuine. “Ah, I didn’t mean to overstep. I’m just stating the obvious here.” he explained. I raised an eyebrow at him. 

“Sorry, sir. I’m not following.”

“You’re connections, miss. You’re connected to the Japanese government, so I’m wondering why you aren’t trying to go from Japan to a tech university there. I mean, you have the money”

I gripped my bag on my lap. Feeling the handle of my wooden katana against my thighs. 

He must’ve seen me tense up, for he chuckled and said “Hold on.” Stefan set down my file, and reached into his pocket. In a flash I stood up, plastic chair clattering to the ground as I reached into my bag to pull out my katana. It unfurled itself inches away from Stefan’s face as he pulled out a small wallet and procured a golden badge. “Ah...” he started, looking at me with surprise. The other men and my friends stood up to look at us in bewilderment. My friends more so because I was about to act violent. And according to the look on their faces, unprovoked. 

“Oi, Sakamoto!” I turned to look at the man who was attending to Marina. I got a good look at him from. He had dark, tan skin that continued downwards into his half open shirt. He had no tie and his sleeves were rolled up, unlike the other men, who all had black ties and crisp shirts. His honey brown eyes looked at “Stefan”, as he bowed a couple of times, apologizing profusely. The man sighed. “Look, we’ve been over this. All we had to do was ask them the simple question of “Do you have a social security card?” and then when they said they didn’t, we would escort them to the back. That’s it.” He put his finger to his temple. I could see a faint bit of scarring from old injuries than ran across the tips of his fingers, all up his forearm. 

“You didn’t need to drag it like that.”

“But, but, Mark, it needs to be slow-”

“And it will, in the back.” Mark said tersely. He looked towards his colleague, the man attending to Olivia, who rubbed the back of his head and chuckled nervously. “Ha, ha, sorry ladies.” He apologized, addressing all of us. “Um, well, you see, you guys don’t have social security cards.”

“We figured as much.” Olivia spoke up. I looked over to Emilie and she looked like a deer caught in the headlights of a truck. “And we know you chicas don’t have them!” Mark answered, amiably. Emilie huffed. “So, what, you just wasted our time, when you could’ve just informed us ahead of time? How long did you know about this?” 

“Since the time you guys were born.”

“Since the time- seriously?! And why are we finding out about this now?!”

“Because now is important. Now, you guys are of age and ready to take the responsibility that was assigned to you at birth.”

“Is this some shitty YA plot? You can’t bullshit me like that, you know.”

“Ah, child, we’re fully aware we can’t fool you.” the man that Emilie went to spoke up, his accent prominent. “After all, she figured out the partial truth.” he said, pointing to me. My friends stared at me, and I resisted the urge to shirk. “Hold on, wait a minute.” Marina sputtered, running her hands through her hair. Then she looked at me. “What did you figure out?” Mark looked at me, amazed. “You didn’t tell them the truth?” he gasped, bringing a hand to his mouth. I looked at him shocked. “We’re fugitives?” I explained. He snorted so loud, I swear I saw spittle. “No!” he gasped out. I looked at Sakamoto and he gave me the same look. 

“We’re illegal aliens?”

“No, miro-”

“Our identities are fake?”

“Well sort of, please be quiet and let me explain.” I stopped, breathing heavily. I looked at my friends and they stared at me wide eyed. “Well damn.” Olivia said, sitting back down. “I knew you were a good hacker, but I didn’t know you were that damn good. That’s some Pentagon level shit!” she laughed heartily, and I felt slightly relieved that she didn’t seem to be mad at me for withholding information. “Well, of course. Ah.” I started before I looked at Emilie. Marina didn’t seem to have a problem with it, because she too chuckled, but remained in a standing position, with her hands at her hips, head down, and shoulders shaking. 

“Emilie”

“Yes, Mirei Kouchou?” she asked, and I winced. Full name means that I’m in trouble. “What is this information that they said you found out about us? Something about our identities being fake?”

I told her, and everyone in the office what I had found out. About their guardians, their secret lives, my suspicions; one of which turned out to be half true. After I finished, I watched Emilie look at me, and then slowly sit back down in her chair, arms relaxing her tense grip on her bag. She kept looking at me, and then shook her head. “That’s a lot to handle.” she finally said after some time. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure I’d be mind fucked if I heard that in the lunch room. Which is probably why Mirei decided not to tell us.” Marina said. Emilie nodded, looking at me, smiling slightly. I smiled back, relieved she wasn’t angry at me.”Plus, it is an outlandish story.” Olivia said, rubbing her nose. “It literally sounds like someone made this up in a true crime drama.” I rolled my eyes. “There you go again, Olly. You have such an obsession with those dramas.” She shrugged, a grim but bemused smile appeared on her face. “Apparently, I’ve been living one my whole life.”

“And how many years would that be?” The man assigned to the till in front of Olivia asked, propping himself against the desk as he smiled widely. His badge said “Wilson” but I doubted that was his actual name. Olivia blinked at him. “Well, that’s kinda obvious.”

“Amuse me.”

She blinked again, looked at me and Marina, who shrugged. I knew nothing about what was going to happen next. “18 years, sir.”

‘Wilson’ smiled, still propped up on his arms, he leaned closer to Olivia and whispered, but loud enough for all of us to hear. 

“You’re wrong.” 

Olivia jerked back a bit, the tips of her ear ablaze, as ‘Wilson’ started giggling. “I-it ain’t funny y’know!” She exclaimed, making ‘Wilson’ laugh harder. Which made Olivia even madder and redder. “Johnson, don’t tease the poor girl.” Mark sighed. Johnson chuckled nervously, glancing at Mark before turning to face Olivia again. “Missy, I’m sorry to laugh, I really am, because this is quite serious.” he said after regaining his composure. He straightened up and squared his shoulders. Olivia did the same, but I guess she sensed his sincerity, so she pursed her lips, having found his reaction also a bit funny. “I’ll make this easier by asking you a question,” Johnson started. “What is the earliest childhood memory you can think of?” Olivia smiled sadly. “That’s easy, when I attended my mom’s funeral.” I stared at her and then down at the floor. I was amazed that she could keep a straight face with that kind of answer. But Johnson shook his head. “No, that was when you were 9 years old and already staying here in the county. I meant childhood memories. Like what did you do with your mom back in New York city?” Ah, that kind of childhood. Wonder what Olivia would say. She doesn’t talk about her mom much actually, or New York for that matter, unless it’s about the heroism of the firefighters that died during the 9/11. 

To our surprise, Olivia stayed rather quiet. Her face had a stony look on it as it became pale and a look of fear was present in her eyes. 

“I- she was the vice captain of the New York fire-”

“I’m not asking what your mom, rather, what Melanie Sachs did in New York. I’m asking you what you guys did. How you guys passed your time, what restaurants did you guys enjoy; there are a ton in New York. Did you guys go to the zoo? Stuff like that, kid.” Johnson’s hands had found purchase on the edge of the table as he gripped it. His smile had faded into a serious line, but his eyes twinkled with something. Later I would realize that twinkle was of curiosity, and impatience. Olivia coughed. “Well, uh, Mr. Johnson, I’m sorry to say but I can’t quite remember what we did, or where we ate.” Johnson raised an eyebrow at her. “Really? Nothing? Seriously?” Olivia huffed. “Yes! Seriously! I was young!”

“You were...young.”

“Yes sir!”

“So, let me get this straight.” He sat back down, and we watched with confusion as he leaned back and propped his feet up on the table. Olivia stared down at him, a slight redness in her face and a look of utter confusion. He put his palms together and pressed the sides of his hands against his lips. His eyes still twinkled. 

“You don’t remember anything from the time you were 4 years old, which according to psychologists is when kids start remembering things, to the time you were 9 years old when you left New York to live here in Pomodoro County with Melanie, which, according to calculations would put you in middle school. You don’t remember anything from grade school in New York?”

“N-no, sir.”

“You don’t remember the day you met Rose Dubuose, you and your mom’s next door neighbor, who would eventually become your guardian?”

“No, sir.”

“You don’t remember the last words your mom told you before she left for work that night in September, before she went to fight the fire in the warehouse downtown, a mere few blocks from here?” The last question got Johnson vehemently chided by the 3 men, but he continued to stare straight at Olivia, who was beginning to shake. I tried to take her hand, but she refused it, gently pushing it away. 

“I-sir, this is all a lot to take it.” Olivia finally answered. She looked up at Johnson. There was a look in her eyes, something I’ve never seen in Olivia’s eyes before. They were wild, and flighty. Like she was caught having an affair and her deranged husband was pointing a gun at her. “B-but I think I understand what you’re trying to put down, sir.” Johnson’s eyes softened. He stood up once again, and propped himself up. “Go on.”

“I... Don’t seem to remember anything from a time with my mom in New York. Or my mother for that matter. I’ve only heard stories of her from Rose.” Olivia stated. I looked at her in surprise. Marina looked shocked and (Aud) looked flabbergasted. “Wait, hold up. How can you not remember?” Marina asked her, moving away from Mark and towards Olivia. She looked at Marina, with a look of realization on her face, mouth slightly ajar and breathing way more calmly than before. “What was that story?” she asked Marina, who looked bewildered and then practically shouted. “Is this really the time to ask me that?!”

“Just, hear me out. Please.” Olivia pleaded. Marina huffed and inclined her head downward. A signal for Olivia to continue. “Your mom told me a story when I visited your house for the first time to give you the notes you missed out in school that day. It was 2011, and I remember because that year we became friends. She said that when you were 6 years old, you tumbled down the stairs and had a nasty injury to your arm because you were excited to see your dad come home.” Marina smiled slightly. “Yeah I remember that time.” Olivia shook her head, looking at her dead in the eyes. “No you don’t remember that time, you only heard it from your mom.”

“Same thing right?”

“No that isn’t the same thing because you heard it from her, but do you remember experiencing it. What happened before you fell.” Marina shrugged at that. “I can’t remember something like that.” Olivia walked over and grabbed her shoulders. “No, you should remember it because I remember your mom saying an important thing about that story.”

“Which is?”

“That was the day your dad came home to give you the pink Nintendo Ds Lite you wanted.”

“So?”

“Your mom said that when you awoke in the hospital, you said you’d never forget that moment for the rest of your life.” Marina grinned. “Yeah, cause that Ds was awesome.” 

“Yes, and it was also released in 2006. When you were four.”

“Yeah, what’s the significance?”

“Marina, you’re 18, and your birthday is on the 15th of June, 2003. The year you turned six-years old was 2008, and by then the Ds Lite had already run its course of 2 years. Meaning it wasn’t the newest console. But I remember when I visited your house to play, you pulled out an almost brand new looking, still pink, Ds Lite that turned on and worked.” At that statement, Marina went quiet. Both me and Emilie looked at each other, in total shock. Marina was, what we proclaimed, the queen of destroyed cell-phone screens, because she has the propensity of knocking things over because she was always so excitable about anything. And when we met her while we were assembled at the gym when we were nine and about to have PE class, she had tripped over her own shoelaces. When the teacher came to help her up, she was missing a tooth and had blood on her chin, yet she still smiled up at the teacher and proclaimed in a very loud, almost proud voice, what we considered the words to the start of our friendship,

“Hi Miss teacher! I’m bleeding from my face hole! Also my mommy told me to tell you that I’m super, duper clumsy! She says I’ve been doing that since I was 4 years old and no, I’ve got no problems in the head. Also I really like Sailor Moon and mommy says I’m stubborn ‘cause I didn’t wanna shorten the laces because they have moons on ‘em!”

Marina and Olivia stared at each other, the former having the sudden realization that before meeting us, she didn’t remember anything and had no recollection of ever owning that Ds Lite prior to her being 9 years old, nor does she remember how she kept that Ds immaculate for two whole years. With that. I had to think back on my won memories, and I’m sure that Emilie was doing them too. 

“So, all of you have come to realize something about yourself, yes?” Johnson said. We looked at each other and then nodded. Grunting a bit with effort, he stood up and rubbed his palms on his pants. “That settles it then. It also makes it easier to explain things, since you aren’t going to deny anything.” He grinned at us. “What, with the revelations and all. Though I’m surprised this wasn’t brought up at all in school. Guess that kinda thing doesn’t come up in middle school often.” The other men started to gather up their things, and whilst they were doing that, we had gathered together in some sort of a comfort circle. “So, this is fucked up right?” Emilie asked in a matter-of-fact tone, readjusting her position from one foot to the other in jittery energy. I too found myself unable to sit still. Marina wrung her wrists and Olivia thumbed her ahoge. “So this must be the big thing that Rose was telling me.” Olivia sighed, looking at each of us. “Well, that goes for all of you as well, I suppose.” Emilie nodded. “To be honest, I feel somewhat relieved.” Marina raised an eyebrow at her. “Relieved? In what way?” Emilie huffed, seeming to release something from her chest. “I feel as though a huge weight has come off my shoulders, like I’ve been hiding a secret this whole time.” I put a hand on her shoulder, putting up a finger, but it wasn’t to silence her. Rather it was more of a gesture to me. “Ah, I think we are the secret.”

“You think we’re mutants?”

“Well, like what they said,” Marina started, jabbing a thumb towards the men. “We’d probably be more susceptible to anything they say. I mean after that, I think I’d believe something as crazy as mutants. Because, wow, like...wow!” She put her hands up and shook them. I couldn’t resist the urge to snort. Marina caught that and gave me a wide-eyed, open-mouthed look. “This is utterly crazy! How is it that we aren’t able to remember anything before 9 years old? It’s like, we were born already being 9 years of age.” Olivia put her hand under her chin. “Well...that seems to be what they were implying, though.”

“We were born already 9 years old?”

“Yeah, I think Marina is right. Not sure about the mutants thing you’re saying, but I can conclude that we most likely aren’t totally human.”

“So like, aliens?” Olivia stated as-a-matter-of-factly, in a completely serious tone and facial expression. I pinched her cheeks. “Seriously! What’s with you and aliens, drama and crime!” I nearly yelled at her. She giggled, despite having her cheeks pinched. “Heheh, you never know~!” Marina sighed, chuckling a little. With hands on her hips she looked at us, smiling widely. “Well whatever it is, I suppose we’ll find out more from here on out.” She looked at every single one of us. “Because we’ve heard something, rather, we’re going to hear something life changing, I say we make a pact.” We looked at her quizzically. She met our gazes with a grin. Marina leaned forward and brought a finger up to her lips. “No more secrets, and that includes committing a possible federal offense, ‘kay?” The laughter that followed seemed to be directed at me, so I understood. No more secrets. I have to know that everyone will understand with a little bit of time. We laughed about our predicament a bit, which seemed a little weird but we weren’t in danger, so there wasn’t any harm in it. The men finished cleaning up and escorted us to the back of the office. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a side door open and in walked the usual ladies, carrying takeout boxes. The sides of which had a fancy logo on it, which I couldn’t recognize. 

“Oh!” Olivia whispered, catching my line of sight. Her eyes twinkled and I knew that look anywhere. “That’s the famous haute cuisine restaurant in Olio county! That’s like a 2 hour drive from here, and not to mention super expensive!” I looked at Olivia and she looked at me, eyes still twinkling. “How much?” I had dared to ask. Olivia looked like she wanted to answer but the man that was assigned to Emilie piped up. His name tag read ‘Johan’. “Let’s just say, our boss was the one that paid for it. Just for the ladies to get out for a few hours so we could get to you guys.” he explained. Olivia turned to him. “Wow, your boss must be super rich! I’ve only heard good things about the most expensive items on their menu!” Olivia exclaimed. Before Johan could say anything more, Emilie piped up. “Mr. Johan, you had better stop talking about food. Because one, I’m really hungry, and two, if you keep mentioning food, you’ll never hear the end of it from Olly.” Olivia turned to look at Emilie, blushing profusely. “I-i wasn’t going to talk a lot!”

“Sure, sure~.”

“I wasn’t!”

“We believe you.” All three of us answered, monotonously. We did not believe her.

Olivia pouted and we just snickered as a response. We were led to a small discussion chamber, most likely where the manager and the staff have their breaks and meals. To our surprise, two men were waiting in the room. Both were blonde and had blue eyes, but one man had on a brown aviator jacket and glasses, while the other had slicked back hair and was clad in a green military attire. The glasses clad man stood up and exclaimed loudly as soon as we entered. “YOO! How you ladies doing? You took way too long to get the picture, but that’s fine! I am a hero after all and I have A LOT of patience!” He ended his statement by laughing. We stared at him while he did this, inevitably freaked out. Also he said that without breathing, how was that possible? The man next to him also stood up, an angry look written on his face. “AMERICA! Are you an idiot? That is no way to greet anybody!” he growled out in a German accented English, glaring at the man, who just laughed in his response. He massaged his temples in frustration. It was evident that this wasn’t the first time this German dude has had to deal with this loud dude. Also, one another thing that struck out to me as weird...

“America? Like the country we are in right now?” Marina whispered to the rest of us. I shrugged, and Emilie put her hands up in the “I don’t know what the fuck is going on” position. I turned to look at Olivia, who surprisingly had the same expression of frustration written on her face. “Mnngh...I feel really frustrated looking at that dude for some reason.” She stated, gesturing to the still laughing, glasses-wearing blonde, who was getting prodded in the chest by the blonde German who was still yelling at him in high bass.

“C’mon, Germany! Lighten up, dude! I just wanted to have a cool and breezy intro, y’know!”

Germany? Like the country? Again? I exchanged a side-eyed glance with Emilie before turning my attention back to the bickering duo.

“No, I do not know what you are talking about! Do your introduction properly, and don’t waste anymore time!”

“Dude, I wasn’t wasting time! That was just part of my plan!”

“What in the name of all that is good do you mean by-”

“Hey, yeah, this is fun and all, but I’m like really hungry and I kinda don’t care about you guys.” Emilie was the first one who broke up the fight between the two blondes, who turned to stare at Emilie blankly. We exchanged glances. Emilie is the second “food monster”; you have to give her food when she needs it, or else there is hell to pay. We call her and Oliva the “Terrible Twos'' because they can throw massive tantrums unlike their usual personalities. “I mean, we don’t know who the heck you guys are, and you’re just gonna fight like we aren’t here? Look, if you’re gonna drag this out, you could at least supply us with fries to watch this all go down.” I heard Olivia snort, but quickly turn it into a cough. Classy. I held back my tears because I was internally laughing too hard. Marina did nothing to suppress her laughter, bending over to slap her thighs. I could see the four men that brought us in here, try very hard to keep their stoic expressions, and fail. Big time. I could see the corners of their mouths quiver. A light blush had spread across the German blonde’s face. He let go of the glasses-clad blonde, who grinned and stood beside him, hands on his hips. This ‘Germany’ and rubbed the back of his head. “Right, sorry. I apologize. Please sit, we’ll be done shortly. We’ll be transferring to a better location for more privacy.” That last word seemed pointed at the glasses dude. “Yeah, but isn’t this way cooler? Like finding out you’re a hero while you were doing something totally awesome! That’s how it goes down in my super heroic movies!” was the glasses dude, laughing away. I felt like wanting to double over from watching this stupidity, but I made a quick decision not to do that and instead opted to just watch what the German man would do, a look of murder crossing his face briefly, before sighing. “This isn’t a movie, America, now sit down.” He ignored the continuous laughter, as he gestured for us to sit, we all sat down tentatively, Emilie with more of a huff, plopped down in hers. I looked back, surprised to not see anyone there. The 4 men had left us alone in a room with two strange men. I looked back at them, and pondered for a bit on what they looked like to me. The glasses guy, who I think is American based on accent and what the German man called him, is kinda annoying. Don’t really get a good feel from him, personality wise, but he seems like a good enough guy. German guy though. Tough-looking face, hard and sharp blue eyes when he was frowning. But when he relaxed he looked just fine, friendly even. I got a good feel from him. He was definitely a nice dude. 

“Ok we will get to the chase here. I’m not going to pretend you didn’t hear us when we were arguing, so I’ll come out and say it properly-” again a pointed word towards the glasses man, who just giggled. Rolling his eyes, the German man continued. “My name is Germany, and this idiot here is America. We have human names, but that isn’t so important right now. The important thing that you need to know is that we are what is called a ‘human personification’ and we, along with others that we are acquainted with, are all human personifications of countries.” he finished. He folded his hands on the table and leaned forward, waiting for our response.


	3. Hot brothers are not off limits, girls.

Chapter 3: Oh Brother

Mirai’s POV

I... Honestly don’t have a response to any of that.

“What.” Emilie said poignantly. 

Olivia couldn’t figure out what to say, or what to do because she was fidgeting so much in her seat. Marina just stared at the two, completely dumbfounded, but then she spoke. “Are we...high right now?” The German man chuckled. “No, you are not inebriated, just confused. I can answer some questions before you get more hungry.” he said, making a point to look at Emilie who just rapidly shook her head.”Nope. No. Hunger gone. This is...hard to wrap my head around. Explain that to me one more time Mr. Germany, man, sir.” He chuckled again, smiling more kindly. “No need for the sir, this is as informal of a meeting as it gets.” he said. He did his explanation again, and I was still a little confused. “So, hold on sorry.” I said adjusting myself in my seat. Germany shook his head. “Take your time, this is a lot to take in.” I nodded, and looked at the others who looked at me eagerly. Probably looking for their questions to be answered in one go. “So, you two are countries.” I started out flatly. Germany nodded while America made jazz hands. “Yes ma’am! You’re looking at the bona fide personifications of the countries Germany and the Great US of A! Nice to meet you, girls!” Germany sighed heavily, wrapping a leather bound hand on America’s shoulder as he brought him down into his seat once more. “Calm down. You are going to spook them.” America laughed. “Dude, chill out. I know all about these girls anyway, so I know what’s really gonna spook them!” Before we could respond, Germany yelled at him. “Idiot! Like that doesn’t sound perverted at all! Retract your statement at once!” America looked at him in confusion. “Dude, why? It’s the truth.” he answered him, then turned to us. “Ok, yeah I know this sounds weird, but hear me out. Personifications of countries know about everyone that resides in their country. Race, age, height, weight, their thoughts even. You name it, and one of us can tell you anything about a person. An example I can give you is about Olivia.” He turned his attention to Olivia, smiling. Olivia in turn shirked at his attention. 

“I know you aren’t good with new people.” he said to her in the softest voice possible. Which seemed unreal to me because this man was shouting to the high heavens just a few minutes ago, and now he’s speaking to Olivia like a scared dog in the corner of a kennel. Olivia nodded, unable to correct him that we already knew that. “So much so that you make it a point to research strangers using Instagram to find out what they want so you don’t say anything that would offend them. Especially with that dude in your calculus class.” Olivia nearly shot out of her seat in surprise. We, however, fully stood up. “Hey we just took a damn oath!” Emilie exclaimed. Olivia’s whole face turned red. Marina pointed an accusing finger towards her. “Plus we told you not to internet stalk strangers. Pretty sure America here knows what happened when you did that during the first year of high school when a guy tried to make moves on you.”

“What surprised me was the bluntness of it all. Really, I’d expect that kind of thing from bland old England, but it was pretty funny when you pulled a fast one on that dude.”

“It. Was. Fucking. Hilarious! He didn’t have a damn clue how she knew about that just from Instagram!” Marina exclaimed, exaggerating every word with a clap. She turned to America with a wide grin. Olivia at this point was red from pouting, while Emilie slapped her forehead. I suppose she forgot we had made that oath literally a few minutes ago. “I mean, you totally exposed him in front of his friends.” 

“I didn’t realize that was a thing!”

“Hey, anything can be a kink nowadays.” Marina said, grinning and waggling her eyebrows in my direction. At this Germany blushed. “That’s what this is all about.” he managed to mutter through his hand over his mouth. Olivia sputtered. “I-it’s not like I was interested in him!”

“I know. He was disgusting.”

“Yes. Exactly!” Olivia said. She turned to face America, who had a grin on his face. “Hey, that ain’t very nice.” She pouted, ears still ablaze. America stood up and laughed in her face, which made her ears turn redder. With surprising speed, he managed to close the distance between him and Olivia, patting her on the shoulder. “I know! I’m sorry I had to expose you like that. I needed something only you would know and something that you didn’t tell your friends!” What shocked me wasn’t the fact that she was still harboring an old habit, it was the fact that America was just casually patting her on the shoulder, in almost an apologetic way, and Olivia was totally fine with him doing so. Well, him touching her so casually I mean. She’s never okay with strangers, much more boys, touching her like that. Olivia still looked at him angrily, pouting that she got exposed by him. She looked angry, but I felt it was like when a brother tells his sister’s new boyfriend what his sister did when they were younger, something super embarrassing. She seemed to realize that she was being touched, and it took her a moment. But when she realized she had stopped waving her fists at her side, and had just turned her head to watch his hand land on his shoulder, still patting her and saying, “Well, everyone has an old habit that never dies down, trust me I have this friend, well not friend, but anyways, he does crazy stuff when he’s alone like-”

“You’re touching me.”

“Uh, what?”

“You’re touching me.” She repeated in the same tone as she used earlier. She looked at our shocked faces, and then looked at America’s confused face. Then back at us. “I’m comfortable with him.” We nearly stumbled because that was just how blunt Olivia is. Good thing America didn’t seem to get the underlying meaning of what she said about him. He just smiled and rubbed the back of his neck, seemingly happy for her somewhat misplaced compliment. “Aw, thanks. That makes things a little easier to explain then.” She looked at him, tilting her head. “What do you mean?” America gripped both her shoulders. Completely unbothered, she looked him straight in the eyes. He took a deep breath. 

“You’re a personification too.” 

“That doesn’t explain much.” She said back. I could see Germany slap his face. “You three are as well.” he told us, after he grumbled something in German, apparently unhappy with how America set things up. “Really?” I said, almost leaning into his personal space. He retracted slightly. “Urk! Yes, you are. Not countries though.” Emilie slapped her thighs. “Oh god, what are we then?” Germany answered her quickly. 

“States.”

States?

“As in, states within a country?” I asked tentatively. Germany nodded. “Ja, that is correct.” He turned to Emilie. “Is that a sufficient enough answer?” Emilie, of course, shook her head. “Which states are we?” was her next question. He stood up.

“Brussels.” He pointed to Emilie. “Madrid.” he said to Marina. “Tokyo.” He said to me and I felt my heart swell. He pointed to Olivia, but America seemed to be a step ahead of him. “NEW YORK!” he shouted at the top of his lungs. He continued to pat her on the shoulder, except harder. “So, am I your sister?” Olivia asked America, and he grinned in response. “Yes ma’am, you’re 100 percent correct!” Olivia shirked, having found her shyness once more with the knowledge of a newfound brother. “Ah, you have a brother now! That’s nice~!” Marina said, moving closer to Olivia. America had moved away to boast how cool he had looked, while Germany shook his head. Olivia squinted her eyes at Marina’s cheshire grin. I could almost hear their conversation in my head. 

‘You think my new brother is hot, don’t you?’

‘Ding-ding-ding! That’s right!’ A shake of the head and a heavy sigh followed that. Marina laughed. “Well, we’ll work it out later.” she said patting Olivia on the shoulder. Olivia narrowed her eyes, but smiled nevertheless. “If it’s you, then is there any room to argue?”

“Nope!”

“Thought so.” she sighed. She paused for a minute before meekly raising her hand. “Um, Germany? Are all personifications of states within countries related to each other?” Germany turned his attention to her. “Well, yes. They are. And to answer you, yes these three also have elder siblings.” 

“Huh, well I already have a sister so that shouldn’t be so different, but to the only children here,” I said, turning to the rest of the three. Emilie seemed to be the most apprehensive one. “that might be a big change.” Germany chuckled at that, seeming to get that feeling. “I also have one last question, Germany.” I started. “Go ahead.”

“How old are you?”

“Quite old.”

I hummed a bit. Emilie continued for me. “So what happened with you?” Germany looked confused, so she added to her question. “Like, did you just appear or were you given something to be, well I’m guessing, essentially an immortal being.” In response, his face became more serious, his eyebrows became knit together. 

“Well, in a country’s case, they tend to just appear. In my case, I appeared from the unification of the Germanic states a long time ago when basically everyone was at civil war. Their ideas of having a unified state essentially gave birth to me. In your case, states don’t appear often. In fact, only 2 states have appeared in recent years, unfortunately one of them has returned to being a human.”

“So you’re saying we can choose to be human?” Emilie asked. Everything had gone quiet, save for the slurping of America. Where he got that shake and burger, I have no idea. Germany seemed to ignore this, instead focusing his attention on Emilie. He shook his head from side to side, his mouth forming a thin line. “Well, kind of. You see, both countries and states are essentially immortal. We can get hurt, but our injuries last but a little while. When a state or country ceases to exist then we too cease in walking this earth. Ceasing to exist can mean one of two things,” He held up two fingers for us to see. 

“First, it can be destroyed by wiping out the entirety of the state. An example of this is the Holy Roman Empire. The second way is disbandment, meaning that either the people or ideals of the country have been lost for a reason. An example of this is the micro-nation, Nico Nico, in Japan.” At that name, I looked up. “Oh yeah, I know about that. They had their own passport, currency and everything except for a massive land to occupy.” Germany nodded at me. “That’s right. Nico Nico, for a time was considered a micro-nation, thus was a personification taking shape in the form of a Japanese middle-schooler. But his people decided to disband the nation, as did he, because he wanted to grow old, thus giving up his immortality for a normal life. He does not have any memories of being a nation. In your case,” he regarded all of us once more. “I’m...sorry to say that you can no longer go back to the life you lived. There isn’t a way to give up your immortality that easily. What happens to you, happens to the state, and vice versa. If you get hurt, then the state will as well. So if you give up your immortality-”

“The state will cease to exist. Or fail to function properly.” Emilie finished his statement, looking him in the eyes. He nodded. She looked at our faces of surprise and simply shrugged. “Not trying to reverse anything that’s happening here, nor do I really want to go back to the life before I knew all of this. I was just curious since I’m still hung up on the amnesia part. Y’know, when we couldn’t remember anything past 9 years old? By the way what’s up with that?” Germany sighed heavily. “The rest of the nations, including myself, concluded it to be a natural part of the personification, since neither American, nor Russian government have any indication of human experimentation. So no, it isn’t an operative of some government trying to one up each other.” he stated. America stopped slurping to add, “Yeah, me and Russia really don’t know why that’s a thing on the interwebs, but it’s pretty funny the things people are coming up with. I mean, seriously, Area 51 is where the aliens are kept? Sure I have Tony, but he doesn’t keep anything there. I didn’t find him there either, he literally just crash landed in my house. That’s where I keep all my nukes so that Russia doesn’t break into my house again. And so that Tony doesn’t steal them to blow up other planets that pissed him off.” I turned to Olivia, who’s eyes started twinkling. “Ask him later, please Olivia.” I said, crossing my arms, not even bothering to see her reaction. I heard her pout. “I-it’s not like that! Of course I was gonna ask later!”

“Sure.”

“Mnnnngghhh!”

Germany seemed surprised. “It seems like you all get along well.” Marina snorted. “Well, stereotypes aside, we sure do! Been together since we were 9.” Emilie piped up. “Were we planned?” Marina snorted, and Emilie glared at her. “Stupid, not like that. Mind out of the gutter.” While Marina laughed, she rolled her eyes, continuing. “I mean, did you anticipate our arrival?” Germany crossed his arms, and tilted his head downwards, eyes closed and eyebrows still knit together. “Well, we did not expect your arrival, but once you did appear, we made arrangements in the respective countries, and the plan was to keep each of you in your respective countries until you became of age, but at that time, it became clear that people were targeting you, trying to take advantage of your existence.” We looked at him shocked. He gave an angry huff. “Honestly, we’re still trying to figure that out, but so far we’re in the clear since the event of years prior.”

“The alien invasion?” I questioned, and he nodded. “Fortunately, it was kept a secret from most people around the globe, not surprised you were able to find that out.” he told me, smirking. I blushed and gave him a peace sign. “It’s what I do, I can’t help it.” He snorted. “Nevertheless, that fiasco has kept any organization from threatening our existence since we were the sole humans to stop them from turning everyone into mindless, lazy, white blobs.” Emilie seemed to ponder for a bit. “So that means we were arranged to be brought here?” America looked sheepishly at her. “Well, it wasn’t your guardians’ plans to bring you all here. It just kind of happened due to circumstance. That, and I totally wanted the responsibility of protecting all of you!” He laughed and, while we felt grateful, we wondered if that was a good idea. Germany must have recognized the look on our faces, because he said, “Trust me, we all pondered if that was a good idea to the point where we almost destroyed a meeting room from the chaos, but eventually, we decided to go with America’s plan since it would be less conspicuous. “That and I totally wanted to be a hero and save all of you from dangerous people!” America butt in, laughing. I saw Germany resist the urge to punch the nation in the face. “Huh.” was Emilie’s only response. “But since you all were to reside here, we all figured it would be best to have guardians with the same ideals and nationalities as the states you represent to have an easier time for you to assimilate and take in your responsibility.”

“Take our responsibility as a state?” Olivia asked. Germany nodded gravely. “We personifications are tasked with the responsibility in helping our bosses, the world leaders, do what’s right for us. We have government positions that we take seriously.” “Which is why we decided that after high school graduation, you guys would take that responsibility in protecting your country!” America said, puffing up his chest and putting a closed fist near his heart. “Uh, hold on, if my sister knew this, which I’m assuming she did, why did she let me pick any course to follow in high school?” I asked, suddenly scared for the fact that I might have to change to a government course in college. “Yeah, your sister knew!” America answered. “But she let you, because you’d know how to do your job. You basically have the knowledge of the entire state, including all laws and people just by existing! You’ll be able to experience it once you actually step into your state, so you don’t need to change courses or anything. Isn’t that totally sweet?” We all had a collective sigh of relief. The possible bills that would rack up from taking extra classes to accommodate this change would be astounding. “Right now there are only two problems.” Germany stated and we all held out breath. He assured us it wasn’t money related, but he asked us to sit back down again. 

“First, is that you all are too frightfully weak. Physically I mean. When you are a state, you get everything, from military strength, that is translated to your literal strength, to culinary prowess, knowledge, everything. The second is that we need you to live in the actual state for a year, as that is the normal adjustment period for personifications.” We all looked at him. “So, you’re saying we all need to stay abroad?” Marina asked, leaning forward, hands stuck gripping her seat. Germany nodded. “The purpose of keeping you there is to get adjusted. Since you are graduating and being sent off to college, then under the rouse of attending college abroad, you would be able to adjust fully to live there and work there as a state. You wouldn’t even need to study anything, but what you desire to study.”

“Plus, simulating a normal life, makes the adjustment more bearable.” America said, waving his arms. Olivia slowly raised her hand. “I’m guessing that includes staying in shape.” she said. Much to Emilie’s chargin, both men nodded. “Training to be in shape, not to necessarily fit into a military setting, but rather it helps in the adjustment because you can feel sore from your body growing, but it also helps to soften impacts from things such as bullets, so it doesn’t kill you right away.” We all made an ‘ohh’ sound except for Emilie who made a groaning noise. “What’s up with her?” America asked, jabbing a thumb towards Emilie who has slumped herself over the table. Marina snorted. “She doesn’t like sports, nor want to have to do much exercise other than just walking around. It’s gonna be difficult to get her to train.” 

Germany stood up so suddenly it knocked Emilie’s head back in a shock. “That won’t do!” he yelled. Emilie shrieked involuntarily as Germany continued to yell to seemingly no one in particular. “You have to train to be able to withstand the strength of a state! Of a country even! I’m going to have a word with Netherlands and Belgium to make sure you get proper training!” America reached over and patted her on the shoulder but Emilie brushed him off and stood up quickly. “Alright, alright! I’ll so some stupid training, just stop yelling already! Seriously! Dammit!” Germany breathed heavily. “Excellent. I’m at least certain you’ll be able to train properly, unlike someone I know.” He looked across to the wall and glared at the empty space, seemingly imagining someone standing there and annoying him. “Apparently not as hard as we thought.” Olivia mused. I snickered. Germany apologized and sat back down, folding his arms in front of him once more. “So, anymore questions?” Emilie inevitably raised her hand. Despite her pesterings, Germany seemed to smile. “Yeah, I think I have two more, first of which is where are the other states of America?” she asked, directing the question to America, who shrugged. “Dude, states appear completely randomly. Like with Japan, Osaka, just popped up out of nowhere, like, he didn’t show up when Osaka was named a domain in his feudal phase. He showed up a year later as a teenager. And is still a teenager to this day.” I blinked. “I have a brother?”

“Two brothers, actually. I will introduce you to Japan and Osaka when we get the chance.” He turned to Emilie. “You also have 3 elder siblings.” to which she gasped dramatically at. He ignored her reaction, turning to Olivia, but America piped up. “You’ve got another brother, name’s Mattie, super quiet and stuff. He represents Canada!” He rolled his eyes and said. “Next week, save for New York because America is already with me, you will meet your elder siblings to spend time with them, before going with them after your graduation to their homes.” 

“So, we will pursue some form of higher education in another country?” Emilie asked. Germany nodded. “Yes. You will. What is your next question?” Emilie shook her head, smiling now and gesturing. “Nope! You answered all my questions, thanks!” Germany chuckled. “Any other concerns?” Olivia raised her hand sheepishly. “Germany, are we going to meet any of the other personifications? Like the countries that we aren’t related to?” Germany nodded, a slight nervous frown on his face. “Eventually you all will have to meet them because one of the responsibilities is to prepare and hold meetings in your state or country. Especially you, New York, since you are considered the biggest business hub here in America.” He answered her, It was Olivia’s turn to whimper in horror. America was the one that comforted her. Or at least tried to. “Hey now! Don’t get all mopey like that! We’re gonna spend a whole week together after school so you’ll probably pick up some tips from me, your heroic big brother, on how to deal with the other guys and hospitality and stuff. I’m great at hospitality so don’t worry!” he laughed and Olivia seemed to shirk more at that, half-scared and half-annoyed. I guess little sisters will always be somewhat annoyed by elder siblings. Though I, along with Marina and Emilie, were happy that Olivia wasn’t trying to hide behind us, like she usually does when a stranger approaches us. At least she isn’t like that with her own brother, America, and it seems that in a span of an hour (I think, I have no clue how long we’ve been here), Germany seemed to gain a little bit of her trust. 

“Well, for now, looks like we’ve completed out mission, America!” Germany shouted. America cleaned out his left ear with his pinky finger. “Yeah, dude? By the way you don’t have to yell.” 

“We’re leaving now!”

“Now?! Seriously, I have to spend time with my baby sis! She’s right here already!”

“Nein!” he got up with a start, grabbing America by the collar of his jacket. “I said that we will start tomorrow, and we will start tomorrow!” America struggled a bit. “Could I at least give New York my number so I could call her?” Germany sighed heavily, pondering a bit before letting him go. “Call me if you need anything lil sis! I’ll see you tomorrow!” he stated, giving her a piece of paper with a scrawled set of numbers on them before Germany dragged him towards the door. He gestured for all of us to follow and we did so. “You’re brother is weird.” I heard Emilie whisper to Olivia out of earshot. Olivia sighed and shook her head. “He’s the complete opposite of me. How am I supposed to get along with him.” she whispered back. Emilie waved her hand. “Well, you’re friends with Marina, how much more opposite can you guys get?” I heard Marina snort a reply. “I can hear you guys you know.” We all snickered in response. 

We exited the building and to our surprise it was dusk. A black limousine was waiting just outside the entrance. Germany basically pushed America headfirst into the vehicle. Before he stepped in himself, he looked at us. “The things I told you are classified information. People were after you, and I don’t know if they have stopped or are just waiting.” he looked like he wanted to say more, but a slight blush appeared on his face. Shaking his head, he said with finality. “Glad to have made your acquaintance.”

Marina’s POV

My friends and I watched the black limousine drive away. As soon as it left my eyesight, I slung my arm around Olivia’s shoulders, waggling my eyebrows. She glared at me, and then laughed. “Yes, I know. You don’t have to look at me like that.” she stated. I gave her a hug. She laughed harder. “You don’t have to do that either.” I kept my grip, nevertheless. “What’s going on?” Emilie asked, rummaging through her cluttered bag. I’m assuming she’s trying to find her wallet, though her bag’s always a warzone so by the time we actually get to a place with food, she would’ve actually found it by then. Olivia turned to answer Emilie, whilst I clung to her. “She had a crush on my newfound brother.” Emilie contorted her face into the most hilarious face I’ve ever seen her make. She looked like she wanted to gag but was mildly offended in doing so at the same time. “He’s old!” she exclaimed. I let go of Olivia to face Emilie, hands on my hips. “So are we, sis! I’m just taking advantage of that.” I grinned at her, and she made the gagging face. Olivia sighed, but a smile still present on her face. Mirai winced a little, putting a finger towards her lips. “Guys, secret remember?” she said in a semi-hushed voice. I waved my hands around. “Don’t worry, we’ll be careful, no problem!” I assured her. Mirai’s eyebrows twitched in annoyance. “With your attitude, it might be.” she said, sighing. Olivia let go of me, pulling out her phone in the process. “Well, let’s not think too much about it right now. Let’s go eat somewhere and mull this over before we go home. I’m sure our folks would want to hear how everything went down.” Olivia had pulled out her phone to show us a restaurant that she wanted to try, but she didn’t want to do it alone. “It’s not like I waited for this day to try it out with you guys!” she had exclaimed, ears turning a light shade of pink. I’m happy that she’ll probably be like this forever, after all, what is more fun than teasing your friend when they don’t want to admit something they actually like doing. Emilie doesn’t have that sentiment as much as Mirai does, but it is funny when we all team up on Olivia. 

As we were walking down the sidewalk towards the restaurant, which was just a few blocks away from the loan office, I brought up something that Olivia had stated. “Well, thinking about our folks; they aren’t really our folks, right? Just some people who took care of us?” Olivia sighed heavily, giving me the thousand mile stare. “How callous of you to say that. I mean, you’re right but, could you have worded that any better?” I snorted. 

“Well, I know, but you know what I mean right?” 

“I do know. But the question is, does that change much though?”

“Eh, not really. I still think of them as my parents. That does mean that they’ll pass right before our eyes....”

“Ok, we’re going into morbid territory. I don’t like that thought one bit.” Olivia put up a hand that meant stop. I shrugged, my mouth going into a thin line. “Well, why can’t I talk like that? People die at the end of their cycle, that’s just how it works.” Olivia put a hand on my shoulder, stare still present on her face. “Yes, but please don’t act like your parents are already dead to you.” I stuck my tongue out. “I know, I’m just kidding. You know I care.” 

“Then please actually show it to us sometimes.”

“Hey.”

“I’m kidding.” It was Olivia’s turn to stick her tongue out at me as we walked up to the restaurant, rather diner, and she opened the door to let us file through. The diner she picked had a unique sounding name, one that I immediately forgot once we entered and looked at the menu. It was a fusion restaurant that served unique takes on diner classics. We all picked something after a few minutes, and then sat back to quietly recollect our thoughts. “So, do we, like, call each other by our ‘real’ names or by our ‘other’ names?” Emilie asked, sipping her glass in one hand, and emphasizing air quotations with the other. “Does it matter whether we use it or not? Either way seems fine to me.” Mirai said, wiping her forehead with some paper towels. Olivia scratched her cheek and chuckled. “I agree with Mirai, it seems like it doesn’t matter, so I say we use what feels right.” I nodded. “Then just our other names then, plus it keeps up the whole secrecy thing.” They all nodded with my sentiment. “In any case, I don’t think we were expecting something like this to happen to us. Kinda like what Emilie said, it seems like a bad YA plot, but it’s happening to us.” Olivia said, turning to Emilie who snorted, creating bubbles in her drink as a response, but stopped to give a proper response. “Except this isn’t a YA. Though I kind of doubt what I just said because apparently Marina has the hots for your brother.” Mirai looked at me in amazement. “You like him? Olivia’s brother? Ew!” she gawked at me and I tapped the table with my finger several times. “C’mon! I find him hot! Let me have a moment!” Mirai looked at me, shaking my head. “I won’t let you~!” I pouted at Mirai, who laughed at my response. “Honestly, what’s wrong with liking him. He’s cute!” Mirai and Emilie looked at Olivia for a response. She simply shrugged. “Ah, well, I don’t see the problem in it honestly. What IS the problem?” The two girls looked like they wanted to flip the table in sheer frustration, but having decided it was best to eat first before getting thrown out for doing so, they bit their tongues, instead offering her the simple, “Never mind.” in the most exasperated tone they could muster, resigning to leaning back in the pleather seats.

Changing the subject from hot new brother, to plans for after graduation since it’s been somewhat compromised by the plan of new living arrangements and, possibly, lifestyles. “Well, Olivia will be here in the US all lonely while the three of us go abroad. Depending on circumstance, I’ll probably see Emilie more often the the two of you.” I said, gesturing to Olivia and Mirai, the former puffing her cheeks. “I’m not gonna be lonely!” she said. Mirai seemed to ponder for a bit. “Lucky for you, you kinda know your brother already. I haven’t met mine yet, but that will probably change tomorrow. Actually,” Mirai said turning to Olivia, pointing a finger at her. “Are you gonna be okay?” Olivia looked at her with a questioning gaze. “What do you mean?” Mirai closed her eyes, head tilting forward, arms crossed. A frown present on her face.

“Well, first off, your place, once our adjustment year is up, will be the so-called global meeting room where everyone will meet, so you have to be super friendly to them. Which brings me to my second point, your brother seems like the type who doesn’t get along with everyone, but he knows people because he annoys them. In other words, a total extrovert.” With the two points made across, I could almost see figurative arrows strike Olivia to her center, as she just realized what was going to happen with her after the year of adjustment is up. “H-hostess..?” she sputtered out. “Well, that apparently seems to be the case. The official vibe kinda gives me the thought of those people who give opening statements before a summit or seminar starts. ” Emilie murmured, also pondering on the thought. I swore I could almost see Olivia’s soul exit her body, the thought of speaking in front of a mass of people gave her the hives. “W-well, Olly, I don’t think you have to worry about that just yet. It’s too soon to be thinking about that.” I quickly assured her, hoping to save her from a nervous breakdown. She looked at me, tears welling in her eyes. “I dunno...” she managed to murmur out. “With a little bit of getting used to people, you will.” I told her. She smiled a little and nodded her head. I grinned back at her. “Plus, I’m sure your brother has eccentric friends so you’ll probably get used to new people in no time!” Olivia seemed to lighten up, though a bit nervous at the prospect, as we joked and laughed about the type of friends her brother had. Our food came and went fast as we dug in voraciously. 

We finished eating and chatting, making final reminders for ourselves for tomorrow. Since Emilie wanted to stop by her uncle’s patisserie shop, Mirai offered to go with her, whilst I accompanied Olivia on the bus ride home. We said our goodbyes to the two girls near the loan office, which was closed at this point, and went our separate ways. Olivia and I boarded the bus and went our way home. “I’m a bit curious to see what your brother is like.” Olivia said, smoothing out her hair away from her face. I hummed a bit. “Well, I have a lot of relatives and cousins, so I think I can deal with older brothers and sisters. Though I’m surprised you handled your brother well enough. At least in your standards.” She told me she was also surprised as well, saying the feeling from being energetically patted on the shoulder repeatedly wasn’t as repulsive as the asshats from our school. Nevertheless she was still a bit uncomfortable, as both men seemed borderline crazy. “They were really weird but fun! Though I agree with Mirai. I got the feeling your brother tends to annoy people a lot, so just be yourself, and I think you’ll be good!” Olivia smiled at me, thanking me for my assurances. “Say.” She started. I looked up from my phone as I was telling my parents I was on my way home. When I told her to continue, she said, “Besides packing for graduation, is there anything you want to do as our last time here?” 

I pondered for a bit. “Well, assuming we aren’t leaving right away, packing won’t be an absolute drag, and the diploma situation rights itself this year, then I say a trip to the lake? Swimming and barbeque? It could be one big thing with our families, both, rather, all of them?” Her eyes twinkled at the mention of the lake, though who could blame her? What’s not to like about it? The clear waters, the trees and fresh air, not to mention the feeling of chowing down after swimming? It’s the best! We both agreed to bring this up as an idea with our families, as a last hurrah for our time here in Pomodoro county. We reached the bus stop nearest to our homes. Olivia walked up to her door and waved goodbye, while I had walked up to the bend and waved from there. I turned at the bend and walked down a few blocks, coming up to the dirt road that led up to my house. 

I entered through the front door to be greeted with my parents, who greeted me amicably. They sat me down and asked me what happened, and I told them. They added a few anecdotes here and there, but the ones that I was interested in was the fact that my brother, Spain, or Antonio Carriedo, as my parents called him by his human name, had given me the presents that I received in the mail for my birthday from where I was 9 years old up until I was 18. Those packages had no return addresses, and my parents gave me the vague answer of “this is from your uncle in Spain”. Funnily enough from the ages 9 to 15, I had received all the materials I needed to make my own tomato orchard with letters asking me to plant them, take care of them, cook them, whatnot which I did of course, because fresh tomatoes make the best red sauce and make great additions to everything, but because I couldn’t refuse them; my parents practically made me plant them, which was one of the few things they make me do, besides read Spanish newsletters and novels, which I also loved. My parents took pictures of me while I was doing these things, most likely to show how much I grew yearly to Spain, much to my chargin. Though, I don’t know if this is because of our connections as siblings or just brotherly intuition, at my 16th birthday onwards, he started sending me clothes and accessories, much to my delight.

I asked my parents if they were lying when I had asked them previously what my “uncle” was like, but as I guessed, they didn’t lie to me about anything except the fact that he was actually my brother and a personification. At least I’ll have a vague description for tomorrow: brown hair, green eyes, tanned skin like mine, and a happy-go-lucky personality. Which isn’t much to go by, but it’s discerning enough. They asked me if I had any more questions, and I had just one. “Did you enjoy taking care of me?” And of course they hugged me and got teary eyed, saying yes they did, since they couldn’t have any children of their own. They were very happy to get me as an assignment and were happy to treat me as more than one. I promised to keep in touch with them after I move out and that I would wake up early tomorrow, to which they joked that the only way I was getting up tomorrow was if a hot guy showed up on our doorstep. I told them what my friends and I were doing and they understood, as long as I don’t track glitter through the house. Leonardo hates the stuff due to a similar prank that happened to him in the office as he was about to have his first Tinder date, which turned out to be with Maya. My mom recalled the look of utter horror and embarrassment as he saw her at the bar they were supposed to meet it. “I looked too womanly for glitter, is what he said.” she had said, shaking her head. “Which was disappointing for me, because I thought we would look so good all bedazzled up.” I snickered and my dad shook his head, but smiled at the memory. We talked about what led up to the big reveal before we went up to rest because it was almost midnight. The plan would start at 4am, so I had to get ready before going to bed. 

As I was staring up at my ceiling while I lay across my bed, I thought of all the things that happened to me today. Some would consider those facts as life changing, but I like to think that I welcomed this new life with open arms. After all, why not? I don’t think of it as morbid, I just think it’s kinda funny it’s me. I mean, it’s not funny to live forever because that’s sad, but it’s funny because I’ll get to see how people live for a long time. I might be part of their joys! Or annoyances, depending on the fights I pick. But nonetheless, I think it will be fun to be a part of the world I live in, in a literal sense. It will be a fun adventure, and I am glad that I get to go on it with my friends. I mean they’re probably thinking what they’ve gotten themselves into right at this very moment, but I just want to see what happens next honestly. Not a lot of people get to experience this, so I think it’ll be fun! 

And I think I’ll do just fine.


	4. Marina's thirsty, 'nough said.

Chapter 4

Marina’s POV

I really need to remember to set my alarm next time before going to bed. 

As of now, it’s 3:55am and I'm scrambling to get dressed in something inconspicuous but not threatening. I pulled on one of my black tops and a pair of denim shorts on. Grabbing the things I needed for the prank, I scrambled as quietly as I possibly could down the stairs. I pulled on my slides by the doorway and opened the door. Olivia was on the other side, arms crossed and a frown across her face as she adjusted her eyeglasses. “You already know.” she said, distaste present in her voice. I chuckled nervously, closing the door quietly behind me. “I kinda forgot to set an alarm, y’know with all that happened yesterday.” I reasoned with her. I shivered a bit from the cool morning air. Olivia noticed this and tugged at the front of her Mets hoodie, expression now that of mild concern, a silent question on her face. “Nah dude, keep it. I’m gonna be sweating later anyways.” I answered her question. She shrugged, joining me in step as we descended my driveway to my family garage, the pleasant crunching sounds of pebbles and leaves beneath our feet. “Did you sleep well?” Olivia asked, linking arms with me. Emilie always had the habit of linking arms while one of us talked while walking, so it just became a joint group habit. I took a good look at Olivia’s face and noticed that she had the slight dark circles underneath her eyes. I frowned, studying her face, then noticing her hair was slightly disheveled, random hairs sticking up from the top of her head and ponytail. The ahoge was still proudly drooping. “Madre, I think I should be asking that question. I mean, I know you’ve been hitting the books and training, but, you kinda look like shit.” Olivia sighed, rubbing her eyes from underneath her glasses. “Mm, I was still up a little after midnight talking to Rose and spacing out. I mean I planned to study a bit, just a bit!” she quickly added after seeing my sour expression. Seriously we just had a literal life changing event and she still wanted to worry about her studies! I mean, yes it is important, please don’t come for my wig, but seriously we always have to remind Olivia to chill or else she’ll dig her own grave from worrying too much about exams. 

We reached the garage and I pulled open the door. We both stepped inside. The red truck sat inside, a tarp covering my share of the glitter boxes. I dragged the doors aside to create an opening for the truck to pass. I unlocked the car and got in the driver’s side while Olivia got in the passenger seat. I breathed in, the strong scent of dirt and tomatoes filled my nostrils. “By the way, your dad isn’t mad right?” she asked nervously, strapping herself into the seat. “Nah.” I shook my head. “He’s cool. He knows the real reason behind the tires and bumper, so no worries.” I saw Olivia sigh with relief, slumping slightly, giggling. Charlotte Sterling and her boyfriend slashed the tires and almost destroyed the back of the car, if it weren’t for Olivia seeing part of the destruction in process during our school’s spirit week a month ago. The reason they slashed the tires and the partial destruction of the back? They used my routine instead of Charlotte’s froofy-ass, k-pop routine that the senior cheerleader’s were tasked with for our final spirit week performance. “Look, no offense to koreaboos and all, but that routine just sucked. Dunno what that fatass was thinking, but it certainly was a dumbass idea. Even more of a dumbass idea to try to destroy the car, bitch.” Olivia narrowed her eyes at me. “I know you’re mad, but Charlotte isn’t that fat, y’know.” she said tersely. “That isn’t nice, Marina.” I turned to her, frowning. “She’s fat and stinky and a cheap-ass hoe. Her routine sucks, she’s a fake-ass cheerleader, and can’t lift or spot for shit. I’m using all the worse words I can use to describe her because she nearly set fire to the entire school parking lot, nearly knocked you out, and almost broke my fucking arm. Fair?” Olivia stared at me for a few seconds, sat straight up, before slumping back down, muttering in seeming defeat, though I could also sense distaste in her words. “Okay, maybe a little fat. And cheap. And a hoe.” I snickered, starting up the engine and pulling out of the shed. “Told you!” I prodded at her, and she prodded back. I pouted at her. 

“Not my fat!”

“Not now Mari, please it’s too early.”

“You saying I’m fat?”

“I’m saying that we’ve had this argument too many damn times and I can’t convince you otherwise.” She threw up her hands. I just grinned. It’s up to you whether you think I really believe it or not. Just know that I’m hot, enough said. “I swear, the only time I’ll convince you that you aren’t fat is when I can carry both you and Emilie fireman-style.”

“I’ll take you up on that bet.”

“Don’t push your luck.” she said, but she grinned at me, making a silent promise that she would actually attempt that feat. And possibly winning, knowing her penchant for a little friendly competition. I snickered, slowly pulling out of the dirt driveway and pulling into the street. Mirai and Emilie sat by the curb, a few boxes, a kiddie wagon, a helmet, and a pair of skates sat beside them. I stopped the car and parked it. Usually at this time it wouldn’t be allowed, but since it was this early, I wasn’t worried about getting a ticket. “Took you long enough.” Emilie huffed as Olivia and I got out of the car to help load the glitter boxes unto the truck. “You still have that old thing?” I diverted Emilie’s anger away from me and to the red kiddie wagon instead. She and Mirai had once rode that thing down the hill that intersected mainstreet, where all the shops and other busy streets were, to test out Mirai home-made solar panel propeller-engine combo. Mirai had made that propeller-engine to help Emilie cart all her borrowed library books back home, and since Emilie was, and still is, weak and clumsy, and being the mini-Jimmy Neutron that Mirai is, she wanted to help her Thing #1. They of course test-ran that thing first, by pushing the cart from the top of the hill, hopping in and then pressing the button to make sure it worked. And it did. It propelled them forward at a high velocity. I swear they were doing a 40 in a 10. Of course that was possibly the work of gravity, but nevertheless they had shot down the hill so fast that Olivia and I nearly had simultaneous panic attacks as they went down screaming bloody murder. Unfortunately the device malfunctioned and could not self-break at the push of the button. Thankfully we caught up to them, Olivia on her skates and me on my skateboard, we pulled them and the cart off the street just before incoming traffic from the main road. That day, Emilie’s uncle bought her a kindle, and Mirai’s sister nearly thrashed her, but in the end just made her promise never to tinker to that level again, and that was the end of it. Nowadays, Emilie is on her 4th kindle model, and Mirai is perfectly happy with coding and tinkering with consoles, though sometimes she goes rogue, like when she gifted a pair of black heavy duty soldier boots fitted with skates to Olivia for her 15th birthday, which were the same pair that Olivia was now donning on, in exchange for her own slides. 

“Yeah, still have it because it’s useful for other things.” Emilie said, huffing and wheezing until finally she managed to load a box up the truck. She wiped her forehead with the front of her shirt, lifting her glasses from her face to her forehead. “And Olly brought her skates. Says it’s so that she can get around faster.” I gave Emilie a questioning look and she just shrugged. “I have no idea what she’s planning.” I made a mental note to ask her later. Mirai and Olivia got the remaining boxes and loaded them up. Emilie pushed the wagon into the bushes and covered it up some more, just in case someone were to take sudden interest in it. She brushed the dirt off her hands as she grabbed her mini bag and slung it across herself. I walked over to the car while my friends grabbed their stuff. A few bangs from the car’s doors a few minutes later, I started the car and started to drive. “Good morning ladies!” I greeted them cheerfully. Mirai snorted. “I can’t believe you were almost late to your own prank. 20 bucks says you’ll be late to graduation.” I peered at her through the rearview mirror. “Can’t wait to disappoint you~. I’m gonna be 20 bucks richer after grad!” I said in a sing-song voice. A crinkle of the wrapper caught my attention as Emilie popped a sweet in her mouth. “Well, we can’t expect much from you anyway.” she said dryly. I nearly choked from laughter as Mirai let out her signature laugh, a cross between a banshee and a highschool maiden, while Olivia and Emilie also let out a peal of laughter. “See, I’m not that late!” I said, gesturing to the horizon. The sun peeked only slightly, giving little light, but it was still relatively dark out. I had my headlights on as we drove to the farthest house in the county first. We planned to go out before targeting the kids that lived nearer to us so that after we were done with them, we could go over to Olivia’s and watch the madness unfold. 

Sundays meant that a form of worship went first before anything, so no one would open any mail, or even get delivered any mail, before going to their respective houses of worship. So, in theory, we could just set up the prank and then when we got to our rendezvous point, we would just sit back and watch the madness unfold. According to my parents, Nations and states didn’t have a religion, unless it was the majority, like with Mirai’s brother Japan, who practiced Shintoism because that was the majority in his home. America, and by extension, Olivia didn’t have a set religion, though I heard from my parents that if America gets invited to a religious gathering here, as long as it isn’t a cult or the KKK, he’ll usually go and celebrate it respectfully with people from that religion. Aunt Rose went to church, but didn’t push Olivia to join her all the time, possibly to just get her used to the idea of religion for the future. I had asked Olivia about the Christian churches and she just shrugged. She was impressed with the pastor’s talking ability and how they could hold the attention of the audience, though she hated the youth pastors because they were older boys who made passes- clean passes, but nevertheless passes- at her when she came with Aunt Rose. So she deigned to go on most days, and opted to study, go on a run, or have a skate from the fields to her house. As far as our friend group is concerned, Olivia and Mirai are the only ones who are active in their own religions. Our group didn’t mind all the religious stuff, afterall, it gave us Mirai in a kimono and the classic Dora the Explorer hair for the Japanese holiday of Children’s day. We bribe her to do things for us with that picture. Works every time. 

“I made low-cal pizza for you. New recipe.” Olivia said. My mouth watered. Having severe allergies can be a pain, but with a foodie like Olivia, she’s down for everything and knows everything. “And don’t worry, I made pizza for everyone.” “And by everyone, you mean for yourself.” Emilie quipped, kicking the back of the passenger seat with her bare foot. Olivia turned to loom back at Emilie, grinning. She slung one arm around the seat and faced backwards to look Emilie in the face. “My words exactly. Pizza is a no-sharing food!” Emilie rolled her eyes. “Contrary to popular belief, dear.” Olivia shrugged at that while Mirai interjected. “Yeah, but do you think she wants to share it with you? The day I see Olivia sharing pizza is the day I die. Which is never now.” Olivia laughed loudly while Emilie kept hitting the back of the seat. “Speaking of which, we’re meeting our older siblings today right?” The thought seemed to dawn back on Olivia’s face as she sidled back in her seat in the proper position, chewing on her lip and looking straight ahead. “I was thinking about it last night, almost didn’t sleep but thankfully I did. Thinking about it makes me nervous.” she said. I could see Mirai and Emilie nod solemnly in understanding. Emilie reached under the headrest to play with Olivia’s ponytail, which was loosely tied. “Despite seeming like a huge annoyance, your brother’s probably super nice! Though he might do things a lot differently than what you’re used to, are you prepared for that?” she asked. Olivia tugged at her sleeves, muttering an “I don’t know”, while Mirai also leaned over to her. “You ready for air horns to be blasted in your face?” she asked. Olivia looked at her with wide eyes, paling. “God, would he do that?” Mirai looked at her through narrow eyes, copying a bored expression. “Dude, seriously? He looks like the type and he is literally America. I don’t mean to be racist but white people are loud as fuck any time of the day.” 

“Who says he’s white?”

“The world.”

“That isn’t a great answer, y’know.”

“But it’s true.”

“Dude, not all Americans are white. And in any case, Native Americans are brown. Y’know the people who actually were already here before the Europeans came.” I interjected. Emilie nodded in agreement. “Yes, that Mirai. Plus I think he’ll take a hint once he spends actual time with Olivia.” Mirai looked at Emilie and snorted. “Or not, depending if they really are related.” After saying that she looked at Olivia with a knowing look. It took Emilie and I a second to get her meaning, but once we did, only Olivia looked at us in confusion. If Olivia is like America and vice versa, that means he’s as dense as a brick. Meaning, he’ll probably be more of torture rather than that quality ‘big bro, little sis’ stuff that we were expecting. That kinda stuff will be hard on Olivia. It took us one week to try to befriend her back when we were 9 years old, and when we did, it took the better part of 2 weeks to really get her to open up without her sticking her nose back into her books or vintage cards. It was worth it though. That conversation had Mirai and Emilie talking about their siblings. Mirai heard from her sister that Japan is a totally proper dude, and he has a katana! Which Mirai says is a plus, since she does kendo and knows all about swords and stuff. She says she’s sure she’ll be fine with her brother Japan. “Not sure about my other brother Osaka though.” she said, tugging at the strap of her bag. I got the feeling that her sister didn’t know this Osaka character too much. “So I’m kinda nervous about what he’s like.” Emilie patted her shoulder. “Well, you’re lucky you only have two brothers. I have 3 siblings I don’t know about! Uncle said that my sister Belgium is a belle, but apparently my brother Netherlands is totally stingy! And I don’t even know about my other brother Luxembourg! Gosh, I’m so nervous I could scream!” “Please don’t, it’s too early.” “I won’t do it now, Mirai, duh!” she snapped, taking both of Mirai’s hands and holding them tight. Another Emilie quirk; when she gets nervous she gives the nearest friend a tight hand or arm squeeze. She’s not that strong, but she can squeeze as hard as a snake that’s just caught a mousey prey. Mirai assured her that she’ll be alright, plus she heard from her sister Lilian that Japan and Netherlands are friends, so she could always hang out with Emilie with her brothers and sister, and with Japan and Osaka in tow if she gets overwhelmed. Emilie then got more nervous at the prospect of having to be okay with Japan and Osaka, and so the backseat became the calming session between Emilie and Mirai. I gave Mirai a thumbs up for the friend save, and turned my attention to Olivia, who had kept quiet during the mini-’oh god I have a birth family what do I do’ breakout in the backseat. She looked like she was thinking hard about something, but didn’t seem like she was on the verge of crying from anxiety, rather I think she was nervous from wanting to actually be amiable for America to be able to have a sibling bond with him. As I focused on the road ahead, wary of the upcoming stop sign, I thought to myself.

‘If I can be the one to help America get along with Olivia, then I can get closer to America and help Olivia at the same time! It’s a win-win for me~!’ I thought to myself. I must’ve shown the excitement on my face because Olivia brought me out of my fantasy. “Wow, plotting to seduce my brother already, huh?” She half-whispered, jokingly. I grinned at her. “Hey, the earlier the better! Don’t worry, I’ll give you plenty of time with him, of course!” She smiled at me shyly, looking at me and her hands. She twiddled her thumbs in nervousness. I sighed and turned to smile at her, pulling to a stop at the overhead stoplight. We were already halfway across town, the fields opening up just a few blocks ahead. She took one look at my face and for a minute stared in disbelief before giving me a huge grin. “Maybe I was overreacting.” I gave her a thumbs up, happy she caught my drift. “Sure did! You underestimate how much I can warm people up to me in such little time! I mean I talk a lot, especially about you guys.” I gave her shoulder a bump. She chuckled and bumped me back. “Say nice things.” she said, pulling up the hood of her hoodie up and over her head. “Of course! I’m a nice person after all!”

“Are you?”

“Hey!” 

We laughed as I started to drive again, heading straight towards the fields. With the initial jitters gone, I felt that my friends and I were actually looking forward to spending time to get to know our brothers today. I just hope they want to try hard to do that too. 

General POV

America took a look at his phone, then back at the street sign before putting his rental car in ‘park’ mode. “Alright dudes, this is the place.” he said, taking the keys out of the ignition before opening the door and quickly opening the doors for the Nations at the back. “We’re here, dudes! You gotta admit! I’ve got great driving skills! Hahahah!” he laughed out loud. “America, er Alfred-san, please don’t yell so loud. It’s 6am, and people are still asleep.” Japan said, stepping out of the car and into the street to pull America into the curb, without much success. “I have to agree with Kiku, Alfred.” Belgium said, fixing her dress as soon as she got out of the car, still holding the hand of Spain, as he helped her get out. “Even if you did say it’s the town’s day of worship, it’s still probably pretty early for some.” America laughed at that, shaking his head. “Emma, chill out! You’d be surprised how early people get up in this town.” Spain scratched his head. “Ah, but I think she meant our ninas might still be asleep, yes?” Spain said, brows slightly knit together over his usual smile, taking a look around the houses, seemingly wary, as if waiting for someone to step out and call them out for being too noisy this early. To his surprise a family did indeed come out. The father called into the house as two young girls with headscarves ran out, playing with each other in the front yard. Their mother, at least to Spain’s knowledge, came out shortly afterwards. She shouted something to the effect of “let me fix your scarves before we get in the car” and the two girls dutifully did so. As the mother led her two girls towards the car, the father locked up the house and turned towards the street. After noticing Spain, and after waving back at Spain in a friendly greeting he jogged up to the 4 people, which surprised Spain. 

“Ya’ll new here?” the man asked after reaching them, speaking with a hint of Southern, which again surprised Spain. “Yeah, just visiting some folks here.” America interjected for Spain, who smiled gratefully for the save. He stepped back a little to let America do most of the talking. “Who you visiting?” the man, who introduced himself as Neil, asked America, who jabbed a thumb towards a red bricked residence. “Rose Dubuose. A relative of mine.” he said, giving the fake alibi. The man lit up, telling America it was wonderful to see Rose contacting her relatives now that her own kid, America’s sister, New York was moving out to go to college in a few weeks. Spain chuckled after seeing America’s face light up at the mention of New York. He walked over to the other two nations who huddled a good few feet away from the two conversing Americans. Japan mostly is uncomfortable with such amiable interaction this early in the morning, and while Spain and Belgium are accustomed to it, given the cultural time differences in their homes, they seemed to have a silent agreement to let America handle one of his own, since he seemed excited to chat away anyway. “I still think we should have gone to visit our ninas on our own.” he said to Belgium, who nodded, but sighed. “I told my brother but he practically threatened Alfred to bring me here for free! And what’s more he only allowed me to go to save money. Poor little brother was actually really excited to come! I told him I could take his expenses but big brother got scary, so I didn’t argue with him.” Spain nodded, patting Belgium’s shoulders. He remembers Luxembourg's face of mild anger before he accompanied Belgium to the airport. He was arguing with Netherlands even up until they both left for the airport, upset that Netherlands had removed him from the trip without telling him, saying it was for his own good. “Though I suppose that’s also a good thing. I don’t want to overwhelm my little sister.” Belgium reasoned. The two men looked at each other and gave a weary sigh, completely understanding where Belgium was coming from. Though Romano wasn’t his little brother, he frequents his place, so he considers him as one, and though Romano begged him to take him to America to get away from his “idiota fratello and stupid potato-head eating jerk” he really didn’t mean that, and besides, all he would do here is flirt with American women, just like last time. And the time before that. Spain rubbed his temples before turning to Japan, chuckling. “So Japan, why didn’t your nino come with you?” Japan looked at him and shook his head. “Unfortunately, he had some business to attend to. He has 3 new restaurants slated and he has to make sure they are up to snuff.” 

“Makes sense.” 

“Indeed! Oh, I can’t wait to try it!”

“I will ask him to reserve spots for us when he officially opens them.” Japan bowed to the two nations who looked at each other excitedly. Before they could get ahead of themselves. America walked up to them. Out of the corner of his eye Spain noticed the jovial man walk towards his family. They all piled in and drove in the direction they came from. The man waved from inside the car while America waved jovially back at them. He turned to face the group of nations, a big smile on his face. “Dudes, I actually think we came super late! I don’t think they’re at home!” Spain whirled to face him. “Que? What do you mean? It’s 6am! The ninas should be in bed!” America shrugged. “I dunno about that dude. While I was talking to that guy, he said that he got up to quiet his dog at 3am and saw my little sis walk out the front door in sweats and a ton of boxes.” Belgium gasped. America turned to her laughing. “Dude, chill! She wasn’t making a drastic move or anything like that. The guy said he saw small boxes. Like this big.” he cupped his hands into a medium shape, the size of a medium tub of Vaseline. Spain breathed a sigh of relief. If he’s learned anything from his telenovelas “But, Alfred-san, where could they be then?” Japan asked, an expression of worry across his face. America shook his head, still smiling. “You worry too much, dude! They’re still in town, and they won’t be leaving anytime soon.” 

“So where are they, Alfred?” Belgium asked, eyebrows knit together. “This whole situation sounds really bad.” America turned to Belgium putting his hands up. “I know this looks bad, but trust me it’s just senior prank season. We have nothing to worry about.” America said, gently. Spain felt the tension release from himself in a form of laughter. “Well now! We’re worrying over nothing then!” he said, patting Belgium on the shoulder, who responded by also laughing, reaching up and touching his hand. Japan still looked worried, raising his hand sheepishly he turned to America. “Erm, sorry, I’m afraid there is a culture barrier. What is senior prank?” he asked in a soft voice, still afraid to raise it due to the time. Belgium answered it for him, raising a finger she said. “It’s when highschool seniors come together to prank the entire school! It’s kind of like a send off; ‘one last thing to leave a mark’, if you will, on the school.” Japan gave a shocked expression. “B-but won’t people be bothered by that? Will they not get in trouble?” Spain laughed patting Japan’s shoulder. “Ay some get in trouble for the destructive pranks, but harmless ones are fine. I don’t think our girls are committing any crimes.” he assured Japan, but turned to America to make sure. “Right?” America shrugged, a big grin on his face. “Let’s find out!” he said. He ushered everyone into the car and drove up the road, past some houses. It was still early so America wasn’t worried that he was driving too slow for the area. “Um, America-san, what are we even looking for?” Japan asked tentatively, a hand gripped the back of the driver’s chair. Japan knew better than to sit back and relax. America’s driving skills are...less than ideal. Especially with how empty the road is now, and not many cars lined the seemingly quiet street. It’s an almost perfect set up for a crazy driving montage that Japan was not ready for. “I have to agree with Japan, here. I don’t know what Brussels looks like.”  
“But I do! So it’ll be easy for me! Hahahah!” America laughed. Belgium gave him a laugh that sounded very unsure. She had a lot of doubt but she didn’t have a choice now. She would have to trust America’s instincts to help her and the others find the girls. America sat straight up and started yelling. Which for an enclosed car, sounded extremely loud. He pointed up the street and started waving his arm, face full of excitement. There were practically stars in his eyes.

Spain was sitting in the passenger seat. He stood up slightly and craned his neck up to see just up the crest of the hill to see a figure. The figure was a female teen dressed in a rust colored helmet, a light grey hoodie with a black symbol on it, black bicycle shorts and a pair of what looked to be black combat boots that were converted into roller skates. The teen had on a pair of black glasses that she pushed back up her face as soon as she got up from her knelt position, she turned around and skated towards their car away from a house, a small grey box sat where she had knelt. Spain felt the car shake a bit, as he realized with a start that America had left the door open and had bounded in front of the car, waving his hands. The girl noticed him and stopped in her tracks, a look of surprise and nervousness evident on her face. Spain and the others scrambled out of the car just in time to see America pick up the girl and hug her. Her feet dangling a few inches of the ground. She let out a small squeak of surprise, but nevertheless let America hug her tightly. She had both hands that gave her face and America’s a bit of separation, which seemed like a futile attempt to give herself a little bit of space, but to no avail. America was known for close range hugs and while she didn’t seem too uncomfortable with that fact, she still seemed a bit scared and confused that he just bounded towards her and did that so suddenly. So Spain quickly went over there and pulled America off her. “Alfred! Can’t you see the girl is scared!” He scolded America lightly, who just giggled and shrugged. He let go of the girl, who stood as straight as a board, eyes widening at the sight of him, Belgium bounding towards them, and Japan graciously locking the car doors behind him and hurrying to catch up with Belgium. “Lo siento, he just gets too excited and disregards personal space. I’m Antonio by the way.” he said, reaching out to grab the girl’s hand and give it a peck on the back of her palm. She gasped and blushed, seeming to be embarrassed. She moved behind America, which Spain thought was a weird reaction. Until he felt a sharp pain behind the back of his, which he figured out to be from Belgium. “Way to contradict yourself! Now you’ve scared her, again!” Belgium chided. Spain chuckled at her, hands on his hips. “Lo siento! It’s a force of habit!” he said. Belgium turned to the girl, who now looked very unwary from the strangers approaching. However she looked at her and Japan in curiosity. “I’m Emma, and that’s Kiku. It’s nice to meet you!” she said, extending a hand out to her. The girl took it shyly, muttering in a small voice. “I’m Olivia. So, you’re my friend’s new siblings?” America patted her on the back. “That’s right sis! We were waiting outside your house, but someone tipped us off that you were around here, so we came to meet you halfway! Isn’t that great?” The girl, Olivia turned to look up at him with a slightly worried look. 

Spain noticed that Olivia was a little ways in arms reach, but nowhere near America. She seemed to want to keep a bit of distance, indicating a bit of discomfort with how close she wanted him to be. “Sorry for the inconvenience...” Olivia said. She seemed like she wanted to say more, but she kept quiet, opting to look down at her skates. America laughed and gripped her shoulder gently. “No worries! You need help getting those boxes around? I’m super fast so it’s no problem for me! Hahaha!” he tipped his head back to laugh and Olivia looked up at him, mouth quivering a bit, struggling to articulate what she wanted. Spain noticed her struggling and asked. “Ah, sorry to ask, but where is...?” he asked her. Olivia looked at him and gave him a small smile. She pointed over to the house up the bend. He spotted a figure approaching the bend. Olivia turned and started waving at the figure. The figure stopped, took note of the people in the small group and proceeded to turn around and make a whistling sound before bounding down the hill. Spain could now make out the figure clearly now: long wavy brown hair, tanned skin, loose white shirt tucked into denim shorts and pink slides that slapped the sidewalk. Her green eyes shone brightly as she locked eyes with him, and instantly his squinted look became a look of joy. He jogged to meet the girl halfway and he outstretched an arm. The girl grinned and energetically gave him a high-five laughing joyously. “So!” she said, regarding him up and down. “You’re my hermano, Antonio?” Spain bowed down, jokingly. “The one and only! Nice to finally meet you, miha!” He reached over and gave her hair a tousle. She responded by bumping hips with him. “Hey, I worked hard on my hair this morning! Don’t mess it up!”

“Says the one who was late.” Spain turned, still smiling, but eyes wide with surprise to Olivia, who pursed her lips to keep herself from laughing from her own quip. America made an “Ooooohh, burn!” and shook Olivia by her shoulder slightly. The girl pouted, blushing slightly. She fixed her hair and pointed at Olivia. “Hey, quit ruining my heartfelt reunion!”

“But Marina it’s true though.”

“Shut up!”

Spain chuckled, happy to see Marina who seems to have a good friend in Olivia. Marina turned back to Spain grinning. “So did you have the brilliant idea to meet us here?” she asked him. Spain grinned. “Nope! Pure coincidence. We just wanted to find you.”

Marina’s POV

“Well, you guys are here now. I’ve called the others over, so let’s just wait till they get here for the intros, then we can get back to the glitter boxes!” I said, holding up one of the boxes. “We’ve still got a lot more ground to cover.” Spain looked at me, an eyebrow raised. “You’re senior prank is glitter boxes” he said, as-a-matter-of-factly. I grinned back at him. “Yup. They explode when you open ‘em up. Showering you with the stuff. Pretty cool right?” Spain laughed, nodding. “I see! That’s a pretty good joke, yes!” We both laughed until I noticed a man with clean cut black hair and brown eyes looking around behind me nervously, bobbing up and down, trying to look behind me. I caught his gaze and he came forward bowing several times. “Ah, hello, My name is Honda Kiku.” he said. A lady with a green ribbon as a headband and a sky blue dress came forward and took both my hands, shaking them. “My name Emma Sinterniklaas! You are so cute, gosh! I can’t wait to meet Brus- I mean Emilie if she’s as cute as you too!” the woman said, correcting herself, smiling brightly. I almost had to turn away from the bright energy this woman exuded. I stared at her for a minute and incredulously thought to myself ‘Emilie is related to this person? How..?’ 

I snapped out of my reverie to look at America and Olivia. More on Olivia because she seemed....happy? I mean, I wasn’t really sure because of the mixed expression on her face. It looked like a cross between happy and constipated. I couldn’t tell which was the more dominant emotion, but nevertheless I walked over to Olivia, who had separated herself from her brother. Said brother made his way over to the two nations and started chatting with them. From his animated motions, I think he was giving them tips on how to make a ‘heroic’ introduction, which didn’t seem to vibe well with the two, as beads of sweat began to form on their foreheads from the exaggerated explanation America was giving them. Judging by their faces, I was sure America wanted them to do something over-the-top, embarrassing or both. Though the Kiku Honda guy, Japan I’m guessing because....that name. I’m not that stupid to figure that out. But in any case, he was actually taking notes. As in, he pulled out a notebook and pen to take notes. I had a feeling that he might actually take to heart what America says and actually use it on Mirai. Can’t wait to see the expression on her face. It’s gonna be hilarious. But back to the issue at hand....

“What’d he do first thing he saw you?”  
“Pick me up and hug me.” I could feel the tired sigh emanating from Olivia, without even looking at her. I looked at her whilst she was cleaning her glasses. Spain appeared beside her. She noticed and inched towards me. I bumped hips with her to keep her in her place. She shook her head, looking at me with wide eyes, but I gave her a silent message. ‘Training!’ I flashed my eyes. I heard small mutterings before she decided that I was right, as usual, and stayed where she was. Spain didn’t seem to notice this, as he laughed at the over-the-top scene unfolding in front of him. “Ahhh~ This is really fun, don’t you think?” he turned to Olivia, who gave him a meek ‘yes’, smiling a bit. “Heheh, you’re pretty cute when you are honest!” he teased Olivia, who shirked, the tips of her ears reddening. I grinned slyly, pushing up against her with my shoulder, almost making her bump into Spain’s shoulders. “Ehehe, you’re right there, hermano. Super cute~!” I mimicked his teasing. Olivia screwed her eyes shut, mouth turning into a squiggly line, face red with embarrassment. “You two-!” she muttered. We both laughed and stopped crowding her. “I’m just messing with you Olly!” I said slapping her back. Spain mimicked me. “Sorry, chica! Couldn’t help it! But I suggest getting used to it. You might get a lot of it soon~.” he said, waggling his eyebrows. “Good~.” I said, grinning at Olivia, who only gave a small distressed moan in response. I gave her a side hug. “Don’t worry! I’ll help you. So will Mirai and Emilie, dude. We got your back. You got this. You’ll be a world-class hostess in no time!” I said. She smiled. A genuine, bright, and grateful smile. She giggled a bit, and I was starting to get happy. I heard sounds behind me and I saw Mirai practically running down to meet us. Up the hill I saw a bent over Emilie, desperately trying to catch her breath. 

“Speaking of Emilie and MIrai, here they are right now.”

“Well, just me. Emilie is well...” Mirai managed, huffing slightly. Jabbing a thumb over her shoulder, the nations noticed Emilie lumbering down the hill at a snail’s pace. “Yo, hurry it up will you?” Mirai yelled over to Emilie, who cursed at her. “Can you slow down next time please?” Mirai turned her back to Emilie, shrugging. “I already told her to hurry it up.” I snorted. “Like that’s gonna make her go faster.” Mirai grinned. “I could try to attach wheels to her feet.” she suggested. “And up her risk factor? Better not.” I shot back. She laughed, which seemed to shock Japan. “Ah...” he started, which caught Mirai’s attention. She perked up and walked over to him, and gave a small bow. “Hiya! You’re my brother Kiku right? Should I call you nii-san or onii-san?” He seemed taken aback by that and consulted his notes. Apparently he hadn’t anticipated that Mirai would be the first to speak to him, as he fumbled with his notes, embarrassed. Eventually, he put away the notebook and bowed back to Mirai. Emma, I’m guessing she’s Belgium, walked past Mirai and Japan, and us as well, to walk towards Emilie, waving jovially at her. Emilie saw her and tried to greet her properly, but failed due to her being extremely out of breath, possibly from trying to run to catch up with Mirai. Had it not been for Belgium, Emilie might have passed out on the sidewalk. Good thing Belgium was there to catch her last minute. Belgium pulled out a small cloth laced handkerchief and offered it to Emilie, who gladly took it with a bright smile. To which Belgium properly introduced herself. I think. I couldn’t really hear the conversation anymore as Belgium put on a happy expression, saying something to Emilie, who reacted sheepishly to what she said. Both of them started walking towards the group, Belgium giggling while Emilie was waving her arms around, possibly complaining about the morning, especially how “Mirai left me alone!”, was the only expression of anger I heard from her, before she said. “Well, I’m glad to have finally met you. I’m no longer in the dark about this whole craziness!” Belgium nodded earnestly. “Oh exactly! When I heard you manifested, I couldn’t believe it! Those were the longest 9 years I’ve had to wait to finally meet you, oh my gosh!” Belgium sighed, linking her arm in Emilie’s, which she gladly accepted. It’s a family thing, who woulda known?

I grinned at Spain when there was a moment where everyone was conversing with their own siblings. “Looks like everyone seems to be enjoying themselves now! Oh, how are you nina? How was your sleep?” Spain asked me, grabbing a hold of my hands and giving them a squeeze. I responded by giving him a hand squeeze back. “Just fine, hermano. Wow, it still seems a bit weird to say it.” I said sheepishly, to which he gave me a one-sided hug. “Well, we have a lot of time to iron out the kinks. But no hard feelings right?” he asked, giving me a side-eyed glance, seeming a bit nervous for my reaction. I gave him a smile back. “Well, you have time with me now, so you better explain it properly!” I gave him a wink, and in response, he gave me a wink and a thumbs up. “Of course! Your hermano will explain lots of things to you, no problema!” he stated. He suddenly perked up, eyes widening. “Oh right, we interrupted you guys right?” he said, halting any more conversation as we realized with a start. “Ay! We still have a few more houses to go!” I slapped my forehead. Olivia came up to me. “How about splitting up? I’ve got my skates, you got the car, and Mirai and Emilie can go together?” I nodded. “That sounds good actually.” America grabbed Olivia by the shoulders. “Dude! I could just take you in the car!” Olivia looked at him in surprise. “Uh, thanks, but I don’t think I can squeeze in with everyone else though...” Olivia said, trying to reason with him. He looked at her in confusion. “Who said anything about squeezing? It’s just gonna be you and me.” he stated. The other nations looked shocked. “So what? We’re just gonna walk to the meeting place then? No offense Alfred, but that’s a pretty crappy way of thinking.” Belgium said, hands on her hips, lips pursed in a frown. Beside her Emilie looked like she didn’t know what to do, eyes flitting between her sister and Mirai, who gestured to just get on with the program and try to sneak away to avoid any conflict. “Huh? What? Dude, seriously? You don’t catch my drift, do you? I’m saying you guys help your sibs while I help mine.” he said, pointing a finger towards everyone else. “Hm. I admit that doesn’t sound so bad, Alfred.” Surprisingly, my brother had no problem with the sudden split up. He gave me a thumbs up, and I hesitated for a bit before shrugging, saying, “Eh, fuck it. It’ll be hilarious either way.” I said, grinning. Olivia looked at me incredulously, and I gave her the “Just roll with it” look, so she sighed and just gave in, putting her hands up. “Looks like I don’t have a choice in the matter here. I’m in, I guess.” she stated with a sigh. Mirai gave me a devious look. “Hehe, that’s kinda perfect actually.” Emilie stared at her. “You- you’re kidding right?” Mirai grinned back at her as she walked over to Emilie, whispered something in her ear, and when she pulled away they both had devious smirks on their face. “You damn genius, I’m in.” Emilie cackled, and I saw Belgium laugh nervously, and Japan just looked in between the two scheming masterminds. Mirai went and grabbed her brother’s hands, dragging him up the sidewalk. “Nii-san, let’s go! You gotta help me with this!” Japan flustered a bit before just letting himself give into whatever scheme Mirai was planning. Meanwhile, Emilie had grabbed Belgium by the arm and almost forcefully dragged her up the sidewalk. Unlike Mirai, Emilie seemed to fill in Belgium on the plan they spontaneously made. Only when they crested the hill, did I hear both of them laughing mischievously. When they left, I just sighed. “We’ve let thing 1 and thing 2 loose. Wonder what scheme they’re cooking up.” Olivia snorted, raising an eyebrow whilst giving me a small smile. “You let that happen, man.” I gave her an innocent look. “Hey, don’t blame me for any mischief they may cause! I’m an innocent baby!”

“You are neither innocent, nor a baby. Don’t lie to yourself, dude.” I stuck out a tongue at her and she just smirked. Beside me, Spain chuckled, placing a hand on my shoulder whilst I watched America almost try to drag Olivia into the car, excitedly asking her where they were going, while Olivia was trying very hard not to flinch at everything America did and instead tried to tell him the plan, but failed stupendously because America interrupted her at every sentence. Looks like my advice will have to wait. “You guys are really good friends, huh?” he said. I chuckled. “Yeah, for as long I can remember.” Spain sighed, looking over the tree line, where the sun just about peaked. “Reminds me of my friends, which I have to tell you about.” I grinned. “Oh do tell, hermano! Let’s catch up and cause mischief!” I waved and blew the American duo a kiss good-bye and they sped off at an incredible speed. I could’ve sworn I heard Olivia squeal in fright in the passenger seat, but maybe that was imagination. I grabbed my brother’s hand and we headed up the hill to where I parked the truck to cause more mischief with the glitter boxes. 

General POV

Japan couldn’t believe that such a lavish mansion was situated in, what America had basically described as, farm country. Him and Mirai were hidden behind bushes in front of the mansion on one side, while Belgium and her charge, Emilie, were on the other side, waiting for the signal, which Mirai would give. He recalled the plan Mirai told him. 

“And what is the purpose of, not only dropping off this glitter box in front of this boy-”

“Buchanan.”

“Buchanan. Yes, why are we-specifically you- trying to hack into their smart tvs to show his parents a video tape that you took...?”

Mirai gave him a disgusted look. “I didn’t take the video. I stole the video from the security office. Buchanan stole something from me, and I want it back. And before you ask: I tried asking it from him, and he refuses to give it back.” Japan gave her a concerned look. “So by showing the video and essentially trespassing property to steal something is how you are getting back at him?” he shook his head. “This all seems uneccessary, Mirai-san.” Mirai gave him a shy look. “I know, but what he stole was, rather IS still important to me. And this is the last time I can try to get it back. Plus, Buchanan’s been a jackass all year, so yeah, I wanted to get back at him.” 

“You say that, but still....”

“I know you’re uncomfortable, and you don’t even have to do anything but wait!”

“I mean, I am okay with doing whatever you are doing, but I just want to ask what you are trying to get back.” A pause. Mirai looked down at her hands and twiddled her fingers. Japan noticed her face turn pink. He inched closer and placed his forehead against hers. Though he felt extremely uncomfortable while doing so, he felt like he just needed to check. “I’m ok. No fever. Swear.” he heard her mutter. He sat back up and smiled at her. “I am just making sure.” he said. She smiled back at him, giggling softly. But the shyness returned as she twiddled her thumbs again. Whispering softly she said “He, ah, stole the do-it-yourself scooter that I assembled. You know....the one you...gave me...” Japan sat in silence. He honestly didn’t know whether to be impressed that she was able to assemble the scooter, by herself, or touched by her cherishing that scooter so much that she was willing to commit a crime for it. He decided to go with the latter. Mirai gave a small squeak as he took her hands, and clasping them tightly, he told her. “A-as your brother, I will help you with everything I have.” She looked at him for a second before giggling. 

“Thank you, nii-san.”

Japan was still surprised that Mirai was able to convince Emilie, who in turn convinced Belgium to join in. Even though she also has qualms with this Buchanan boy, the only thing she had brought to the table was a tupperware of cookies. And though he couldn’t make out the words, since they were speaking in Dutch, the only thing that sounded like English was the word “laced”. Which when he asked the girls, Belgium offered an ominous “You’ll see~.” and he backed off at that, not wanting to be part of that scheme. He held the laptop gently, balancing it on his lap as Mirai snuck under the gate security camera. She pulled out her phone with one hand, and placed the other flush against the cream wall, palm facing outwards, fingers outstretched. She stood there in silence looking towards the house. She perked up at something Japan and the others couldn’t see. She waited a few minutes before closing her hand into a fist, as she pressed something on her phone. A slight whirring sound was heard as Japan noticed the security camera hang slightly, and the gate opened slightly. The three girls scrambled through the gate heading in opposite directions; Mirai heading to the right, Belgium heading straight to the front door, a grey box in hand, and Emilie towards, what looked to be a nice treehouse, cookie box in her tightly gripped hands, smiling deviously. 

Instead of a rope ladder, it had more of a wooden walkway leading up to a nice looking patio overlooking the property. From where Japan sat and hid, the treehouse seemed much more upscale than the dingy tree houses he’d seen on his way here. It had glass windows and a wooden double French door leading inside. It even had a pool table on the patio, along with nice-looking folding chairs and tables. The only conceivable reason it’s still considered a tree house is the thick tree trunk and branches sticking up from the middle of the whole thing. Otherwise, it would have been considered another house entirely. Apparently, Emilie had been to the treehouse before, but only briefly to deliver pastries to the residence. The Buchanan boy had skipped baseball practice to “fool around” with his lady friend and illegally drink beer with his “crew” in the treehouse. Not only did the boy skip practice, but he had allegedly thrown a bottle of his own excrement (the liquid kind) at the poor girl, while his friends laughed. And worse of all, paid her less than what the delivery charge was asking. The said charge was 10 dollars. The boy gave her two, saying she should be grateful. So her response to that was to apparently give him cookies, which Japan could not fathom why that was the response, but Belgium said it was an excellent idea and Mirai agreed, so he agreed as well. Once he saw the two girls creep out, he pressed some commands on the computer and waited. A few minutes of silence went by, which was shattered by the crashing of plates and a name being called in a shrill voice, followed by loud slamming. The two girls broke into a run, cackling at their work. Japan closed the screen of the laptop and hurriedly rushed from out of the bushes. Just in time to see Mirai roll out with the scooter. The paint chipped in a few places, and the small engine seemed to be dinged, but otherwise, it was still a perfectly good and functioning scooter on the surface level. It even had a small Japanese flag sticker on the front. Mirai motioned for him to hop on and he did, and as he did so, placed her laptop into her backpack. He fumbled around on where to place his hands and eventually settled on her shoulders, gripping them tightly and awkwardly hunching. “Ah...this will not be very good for my back.” he said. Mirai revved the engine and quickly sped off, away from the residence, lest they be caught. “I have a back massager at home, nii-san. I’ll ask Lilian to lend it to you!” Mirai said. Japan smiled gratefully. “Thank you very much. I would greatly appreciate that.”

“No prob, Bob!”

“No...my name is Kiku.”

“It’s just and expression, nii-san.”

“Oh.”

You’d think that the personification of America would be well equipped with every topic under the sun, including conversation starters or ice breakers. But nothing was breaking the ice between new found siblings. America could almost feel the sweat under his armpits. Olivia sat beside him in the passenger seat, attempting to clean her glasses from the mud that had gotten on them.

Clearly, their prank run had gone horribly.

First off, he went the wrong way. Olivia had informed him of that fact 20 minutes into him driving the wrong direction. It was partially his fault, though. He had been talking about why Canada was going to be late coming to the county, on the count of some work still left over in his place. It was also partially Olivia’s fault. The girl did not interrupt him, nor attempt to do so. But he felt bad at that thought because of the look on her face when he seemed to get too touchy feely. But he couldn’t help it. She was a cute kid, and he couldn’t wait to have the touching sibling moments he’s always wanted with a sister he’s seen on his tv shows. Sure he’s had some with Canada, heck even Molossia, but they were both grown men. And yes, he did, and could, have the same sibling moments that would make anyone jealous (England especially), but he dreamed of a younger sibling that he could impart his heroic wisdom on. He could get it, if he knew how to handle Olivia. And America wasn’t that stupid. He had not listened to her. Not in going the right direction, first off, and second, accidentally setting off the prank prematurely and at the wrong house. 

Before the imminent disaster scenario of denying his own sister free speech, she and him had both agreed to alternate houses, meaning he would put the box first, then Olivia, then him, and so on and so forth, until the boxes assigned to them were gone. Unfortunately, since he went the wrong way and apparently did not heed Olivia’s warnings, he had stopped in front of the so-called ‘Grinch’ of the county, a guy called Mr. Harold. Though they were far from the fields, it was plenty rough and muddy on this guy’s front lawn. America had literally jumped out of the car, and ran with the box to the dilapidated front porch, vaguely hearing Olivia scream at him. He couldn’t make out the words but they were probably something along the lines of ‘This is not the right house!’ In his excitement to get out, the box’s lid had gone slightly askew. He went to fix it right at the front door. It exploded right in his face with a loud boom. He stared down at his hands in horror and looked up just in time to see the barrel of a gun pointed right in his face. He ducked down from Mr. Harold’s gun. He scrambled to get on his feet and for a split second his heart jumped from his chest to his mouth. At some point, in an effort to stop him, Olivia had gotten out of the car and rushed towards him. Right now, she was on the ground and lay unmoving. Though his fears were quelled when she too scrambled up and gave him a look of pure fear before booking it to the car. He scrambled to the car as well, internally wincing at the bullet-sized hole on the side of it. He jumped in the driver’s seat, simultaneously wiping off as much glitter as possible and at the same time trying to start the car. Surprisingly it started up right away.

“Oh hey look, it’s not broken-”

“DUDE DRIVE!”

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Mr. Harold aim at his window. He floored the gas and sped out of the driveway. The car jerked and rocked a bit from the sudden speed, but settled once they got on actual paved road. Once they were a safe distance away, Olivia quietly informed him the right way to go. And the silence just continued to grow between them. He kept itching his nose, not knowing what to say to his sister, who continually rubbed her glasses, simultaneously pushing strands of hair out of her face. Silently, he tried to turn on the ac, unfortunately, it seemed to be busted. Just his luck. He glanced over at her face. The clips that once held the hair out of her face was gone; those must have snapped off as she hit the ground. Her face was slightly damp with mud and mildew, but otherwise she had cleaned herself off using her now very dirty Mets hoodie. America did a double take at the hoodie. “Hey, you’re using the hoodie I gave you!” 

“It’s dirty.” was the immediate answer, which America didn’t expect. 

“Aww that doesn’t matter to me, we can wash it when you get home.” 

“It matters to me.”

America noted the terseness in her voice, and decided not to address what she meant right now. He redirected the topic back to her. “You ok?” “I’m not hit. I ducked, so I’m good.” “Ok. That’s good. Oh man, the car got hit and this is a rental.” There was a slight pause before he heard Olivia in a small voice. “I could ask Mirai to look at it.” America gave her a side-eyed glance. She caught his gaze and gave him an apologetic smile. She quickly looked away and the smile had faded quickly, but he felt that he succeeded, somewhat in the sibling department. He’ll just have to think of better things to talk about. 

Marina was having a great time.

No. No. There isn’t a joke here, she’s actually having a good time. Surprisingly, Spain was so down to placing the boxes, he made the whole thing a production. She was almost done with her boxes. “I’m excited to see the look on their faces when we get their first.” 

“Oh you know it! Ah, are you always late?”

“Yeah, I am. You’re not gonna be mad about that right?”

“Nah! Good looks take time to get ready trust me, I know, I have that too!” They both laughed at their own expense. They were coming up on the East side of town. A route that Marina knew all too well, unfortunately. This side was, for some inexplicable reason, a place where all her exes came from. East-siders tended to be more eccentric and hipstery (according to Olivia). It’s also where Charlotte lived, so fuck her. But in any case, she had expressed this loathing to Spain, who immediately wanted to egg her house, but she decided to be a grown woman in this case.

She stuck to one-week smoothie packs.

Doesn’t seem diabolical on paper, but when you fill said bags with weight-gaining protein powder, it makes things much more fun. Especially with prom coming up. And that her “hot date” was her ex (bleurgh). Again she told this to Spain, who suggested laxatives or something to postpone the date, but she brought up the point that with Charlotte’s weight gain, she would throw a massive fit not being able to fit in her dress. And Charlotte’s meltdowns are legendary. Or infamous depending on what end of the stick you fall on. It was a Regina George level meltdown. And it filled Marina with nothing but excitement to hear about her fiasco during prom itself. The tweets will be legendary. And her ex would suffer. And she had the opportunity to hang out with America, so all in all it was a win-win situation. 

“You know, back at home, there are quite handsome men around!” Spain said, waggling his eyebrows. Marina giggled. “Thank you, hermano. But don’t worry I have my eyes on a man right now.” Spain hummed, smiling to the ceiling. “Is it someone I know?” he asked her. “Get the fuck out!” she exclaimed, mouth agape. Spain grinned cheekily at her. “Look, I get it. It’s America’s ass. Literally. You can’t get that kind of culo anywhere else. I may have a nice ass, but I appreciate other fine ones.” Looks like singing praises run in the family. “So you’ll help me?” I asked. “Help you? Please. Do you need any help?” He asked, giving me a questioning look. I fell back and sat back up again. “I, well, I don’t know! I don’t know him, and Olivia-” 

“Does your friend have an issue with that?”

“No, she’s cool with it.”

“Sweet girl.”

“Exactly! But he’s different from Olivia but at the same time, alike? Does that make sense?”

“They are alike?”

“Well, I think so.”

“Well, we’ll see. Tell you what, I can help you.”

“Really?”

“Yes! I am an expert on the language of love. Well, my friend France does, but I know it just as well as he does, in fact even better! But don’t tell him that.” He waggled his eyebrows, and Marina just laughed. “I am the best matchmaker, trust me. But it isn’t going to be easy.” She shrugged. “I mean I kind of suspected. With the whole personification thing.” Spain sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. “Well, yes there’s that. I actually wanted to ask you, are you okay with leaving the country?” Marina paused for a second, and Spain got visibly nervous. “Well, it does make me nervous to be leaving this place behind.” She said, gesturing to the passing houses. Spain looked out of the window and nodded. Though the houses were quite clustered together, mismatched and outdated, they had a sort of unity to them. It reminded him of something, actually. “Are you worried about not seeing your friends?” he asked her. Marina shrugged, taking the time at the stop sign they were at to look around at where they were. To her immediate left was one of the parks they had in the county, which was conveniently located next to a sheriff’s station, in case some idiot wanted to kidnap some kids. The term idiot here is used in a light sense, simply because you have enough fitness buffs and ex-veterans to make an entire army. “No, cause I know I’ll see them again. Guess I’m just nervous to see what will happen to them without being together. I mean we’ve seen all the awkward phases we’ve been through, from Naruto to Emo, though the jury's still out on whether Olivia’s still in it. I swear her wardrobe is basically dress to depress.” Spain chuckled at that, while Marina huffed. “Yet she still has nice shit. Though, I guess, I’m worrying too much, huh?” 

“Well, yes. As the saying goes, “Your journey has only begun”!” 

“But what is that journey? Were we chosen for this? I mean, I don’t even know if Olivia actually had a mom! I mean, that’s crazy being told that your memories were basically fake.” The light turned green, and they took off. The road becoming much more posh as the houses started to look more upscale and less rundown as before. Spain inhaled sharply, leaning back. His arm reached back to grab the last box, plus Marina’s little “present” for Charlotte. “Well, I don’t know much about whom you called Olivia’s mother. But all I know is that Olivia was what you would consider as a control group.” Marina gave him a side-eyed, questioning look. “What, like an experiment?” Spain nodded, face hardened, which surprised Marina because up until this point, even at serious topics, such as how she lost her virginity or how she accidentally hit and ran someone without ever telling her parents, whom she still called parents and Spain had tearfully joked about how he should tell them that he is their son. He then told her that at least in the end she apologized and that she was responsible for her own mistakes. It’s okay to make them, but he was proud that she was able to own up to them, and smile in the process. But just like that reaction, she considered her brother to be quite cheerful and happy despite everything, but the face he made right now was grave. “I don’t mean this in a bad way, but Olivia was the experiment. You see, you, Marina, were actually born in Spain. But I sent you here.” Marina felt like she wanted to stop the car and pull over but Spain leaned closer to her, almost whispering to her. 

“When Olivia appeared 9 years ago, she really was in New York city, but in a secret location. The kind of thing that only secret service agents knew, not even high ranking officials like the President were included in that list. But almost as soon as she manifested, people showed up and tried to take her. Luckily the U.S secret service fought them off, and Olivia doesn’t seem to know about that time, thank goodness.” Marina felt second-hand relief. “That sounds traumatizing.” She stated, flatly. Spain snorted. “Early personifications don’t have that much memory intake to begin with.” He continued. “In any case, that attack prompted an emergency meeting. It was quickly revealed to us that the attack was part of an organization. Though the organization seemed juvenile, they were quickly appearing throughout the world. The latest one being in New York. America’s people were able to quietly get rid of the contacts here, but we didn’t know where it began, nor knew when it would strike again, if ever. So we decided to put all of you here. It was far away from any big cities, and most of the documents from the New York attack were destroyed. Along with anyone else who had information. America’s people planted agents within that organization to throw the higher-ups off your girls’ trail. Add to the fact that, that sect was new to the area, so there was a pretty good chance that we could lose them.”

“Hermano, that seems like a pretty stupid idea just putting us all together.”

“Yes, but it was more to track you girls, and pin you to one place instead of four separate places. Plus we had a guarantee!”

“I don’t think throwing them off by putting in sleeper agents was any help.”

“Ah not that guarantee, I mean the alien invasion was the guarantee. And in any case, some nations were against that idea in the first place anyway, including myself. I did not want to give you up.” Spain stated. “You gave me up at, uh... Actually when did you give me up?” Spain smiled sadly at her. “I gave you up almost as swiftly as you had appeared.” “And this was 9 years ago.” she stated. Spain nodded, grave face still written across his face. Marina’s eyebrows knit together in confusion. “But how come I was told my memories start at 9 years old?”

“Because I had repressed them. We didn’t know what would happen to you if that organization got a hold of you guys, so we repressed some of your memories to be sure.” When Marina still gave him a look of confusion and an “I don’t get it”, he sighed and said. “Nations have the power of erasure. We can erase any memory from any of our citizens, but it takes a lot of energy. And when that happens a person can “fall asleep”, to compensate for the large amount of energy being taken out from them. It’s what you would call a medically induced coma, because by taking your memories, I’m essentially taking your life force, since you were only a small child when I did it to you. So by giving you my own life force, you would live, but in the process, get aged up. It just so happened to stop at 9.” Spain paused to let Marina take in all the information. After what seemed like forever, she sighed heavily. “Damn, that’s deep.” Spain threw up his hands. “I wanted to wait until we were home, but I guess this is fine too!”

“Sorry.”

He put down his hands and smiled brightly at her. Looking into her eyes. “No, no. I should have expected this curiosity. Sorry for keeping it from you.”

“Thanks for keeping me safe.”

“I love you, hermana! Of course I want to keep you safe!”

“So the reason for bringing me, well us technically not just me, home at this point in time is..?”

“Right age, Mature body, psychological readiness...suddenly it sounds really perverted when I say it.” Spain said, stopping mid-sentence, realizing his wording was slightly off. Marina and him burst out laughing, which put the easy going feeling back into the car, as it felt like a heavy blanket was lifted off the both of them. After a while Spain continued, in a much more light-hearted tone. “We wanted to have the right conditions for you girls, in order to pass down the knowledge of decades, and the responsibility for it. As well as ensuring that the environment would be safe for you.” Marina shrugged. “Makes sense. Can’t believe that the aliens made a window of opportunity for you guys.” 

“Hey, we were surprised too. It was a happy accident from something completely outrageous.” 

“And speaking of happy accidents, let’s give Charlotte one right now.” Marina said, slowing down whilst gesturing to a house on her right-hand side. Spain studied the house. Black Porsche, white picket fences and no sign indicating that there were security cameras. Perfect. Before she got out, Marina looked into Spain’s own green eyes. Holding unto him by the shoulders, she said with a smile. 

“Thanks for everything, hermano.”


	5. This doesn't happen all the time! We swear!

Chapter 5

General POV

It was now 9am. Normally there wouldn’t be any noise during this time on a Sunday apart from church bells, chiming to let anyone who hadn’t attended the 8am mass was free to attend the next mass. But on this particular day, screaming and strings of curses were heard as Olivia, who was caked in mud, strands of hair flying across her face as she skated down and around the bend, leaning forward to accumulate speed. A few minutes later Mirai and Japan were seen almost shooting down the hill at a breakneck speed. Japan was at the helm of a scooter, trying to steer his way as carefully as he could whilst maintaining balance for Mirai who was fiddling with the back of the scooter. Following behind them was the red truck that contained the three nations, Emilie and Marina. Emilie who was on the phone practically screaming into it.

There’s a good explanation for this madness.

Emilie’s POV

Sister Belgium is surprisingly good at getting things done quickly. She was efficient in the distribution and honestly I’m shocked that I did such a poor job on the last few houses. She says that she had to hustle to get stuff done because Brother Netherlands is way too stingy, and tended to haggle for just about anything for a better price. By the time he was done haggling, the morning market would be closing. So Sister Belgium would just go and buy whatever she needed, haggle if necessary, but mostly just buy at face value, and then circle back to Brother Netherlands and just tell him that yes, I haggled, no I’m not lying. And he would be none the wiser. Which is honestly fantastic and I admire that so much. Though she has it in her, I know Sister Belgium won’t bullshit me. I asked her as we were making our way to the Buchanan residence, the real reason why I have to come live with her from now on starting after graduation. She gave me a gist of it, and honestly I couldn’t wrap my head around a lot of it, but basically it’s going to help us adjust to life in general. She wanted to tell me about the whole reasoning behind it, but I told her that maybe a neighborhood isn’t the place to divulge such sensitive information, and she hastily agreed. She told me she was worried that I was going to ask for the information right there and then, but thankfully I wasn’t going to ask for it until we were in a better place. Plus this is my time to get to know more about her, not the interrogation period. 

We had a lot more pressing things to talk about after our little scant on the Buchanan residence. We were relatively far from the mansion, I’d say about 10 minutes away from it, so I decided that right there and then was the perfect time to ask her a very important question. Which was a better topping on waffles: whipping cream with a singular piece of chocolate or whipping cream with a single blueberry on it? This was the pressing question that has encapsulated my mind and I demand to know from a culinary perspective. She said chocolate, of course, and I wholeheartedly agreed. I appreciate Olivia’s ideas, but she just doesn’t understand waffles like I do. Sure, she may be one of the culinary giants of the culinary world, state-wise (as per recent events), but when it comes to waffles, I shan’t be beat! I swear that on my mint-green stand mixer! I told my sister that I really appreciated such a grand gift, but wondered what my brother thought of it. Sister Belgium said he almost fainted, and when he awoke, he moped for the good part of the day, until Switzerland came and just so happened to drop off homemade bread that Liechtenstein was learning to bake. Thankfully, that seemed to pacify him for a short time, but long enough for him to forgive him. I asked her if any other nations dropped by her place, and she said all the time, especially the people whom she called the “Nordics”, whom I believe are the nations of Denmark, Sweden, Iceland, Finland and Norway. “Interesting.” I mused. “Tell me about my brother, Luxembourg, right?” She clapped her hand together and gave me a huge smile. “I’d be happy to tell you about him! But, we are done right?” 

“With the boxes? Oh, yes! We are very much done. We can go back now.”

“Oh wonderful! Ok, now where do I start?”

“Perhaps with what he looks like, then maybe his personality; His quirks, pet peeves, etcetera.”

“Oh, that’s simple! He’s-”

She was interrupted by the sound of distant yelling. We both looked just in time to see a flash of silver pass us by. The wind from them picked my sister’s skirt up, which indicated that they were going down at a very fast pace. “Goodness!” She exclaimed, brushing strands of hair out of her face. “What was that?” 

“I think the better question is who?” I said, reaching into my pocket for my phone, which was vibrating loudly. I took a look at the screen and answered right away, putting the call on loudspeaker. The first thing I heard was someone saying: “Oh dear! I think this thing has malfunctioned!” Amidst the sound of the wind and the voice, another voice piqued closer to my ear. I had to hold it away from my ear because Mirai was yelling too loudly. 

“WE NEED HELP!” I heard her yell. I looked at my sister and we started walking down the road at a very brisk pace, eventually breaking out into a run. Through my labored breaths I had managed out a “With what?!” a very smart response. Nevertheless Mirai answered back. 

“THE BRAKES ARE CUT!”

“What brakes?!” I answered back, smartly. Rightly I got a swear back, followed by chastising, and further followed by the answer I dreaded. 

“THE SCOOTER WON’T STOP! THE BRAKES WERE CUT!”

“Emi, I heard that! End the call and get America on!” Belgium shouted, looking at me from behind. I gave her a thumbs up, and let her run ahead of me as I slowed my pace, but did not stop running as I called Olivia. She picked up right away. I explained the situation and she told me she would stand in the middle of the road to intercept them. I told her she was being stupid to do that, and that she would get hurt, but she argued back that it was the only way. America had piped up loudly. Most likely beside her, but I ignored him. I snapped at her and told her that, no, there was another way, and in the midst of our argument, I reached the hill that overlooked Olivia’s area. I saw her near the sidewalk looking down at the escaping figures of Mirai and her brother, practically flying down the hill heading downtown. She turned around, and even from here, I could see her worried expression. I made my way down the hill as fast as I could. I had the urge to ask why Olivia was as dirty as she was, but decided against it. The other nations were talking amongst themselves, but as soon as Olivia, Marina and I regrouped with them, then quieted down for a while before America spoke up. “Dudes, sorry we couldn’t stop them.” he apologized. Olivia turned to me and gave me an apologetic look, rubbing the back of her head. I felt a little guilty for snapping at her like that. “Olly, I apologize for yelling.” I told her. She smiled and shook her head. She lightly punched my shoulder. “No problem, I think I have a way to fix this.” I turned to her fully. The others also tuned in silently. “How?” I managed out, still out of breath. She breathed out before saying “Redirect traffic.” Marina scoffed. “Redirect traffic? On a Sunday?” 

“Sorry, will Monday work better for you?” Olivia snapped back. I had to stop myself from busting out in laughter, as the expressions of the three nation turned from confusion to shock as they just stared at Olivia. Olivia wasn’t as goody-goody as they thought. They’ll learn eventually. Marina swore. “Damn, chill it with the sass, sis.” I nodded. “I have to concur. Though I enjoy sarcasm as much as you do, Olly, now is not appropriate. It also isn’t appropriate that we’re just standing here, so we’ll use your judgement on this.” I thought Marina’s head would fly off as she whirled towards me. “Are you kidding?” I gave her a look. “There’s no other logical solution! I saw Mirai trying to fix it, while it was moving! Clearly waiting for her to fix it isn’t going to help us here! I mean, need I remind you about S.S Waffle?” Marina closed her eyes and groaned. “Right. Sorry Olly.” she sighed, apologizing to Olivia in the process, who just nodded, not noticing the looks of shock she had received from her comment. America and Spain stared at us in confusion while Belgium giggled. “Such a cute name.” she chuckled. My expert naming skills come in handy, but not at this moment. Olivia was already fixing that half a bowling ball on her head, aka her riding helmet on her head. She hopped on one foot and then the other to get her black boots on. America quickly came forward. “Wait, wait, wait, are you going to run after them?” he asked her. He quickly redacted his statement when he saw Olivia click her heels together, Dorothy style, as a set of skate wheels unlocked from her boots with a satisfying click. Ignoring America’s look of shock, she said to me. “I’ll go tell Miss Betty about the situation. The rest is up to you guys though. There’s only so much I can do.”

“Leave it to us.” Marina said, heading to the car, simultaneously pushing her brother and America towards her truck. “Go already!” Olivia did not need to be told twice. She took of at running speed before positioning herself at an angle to gain traction. She got it quickly and raced off. The rest of us climbed into the truck, Marina in the driver’s seat, America in the passenger’s seat, and Spain, Belgium and I squished in the back seat. Th car took off with a jolt, making me almost lose grip on my own phone as I pulled it out.

“Oi!”

“Sorry, sorry! In a hurry!”

“Well, don’t cause an accident!”

“Again, I apologize!” I gave some form of verbal recognition for her mistake as I dialed Mirai again. When she didn’t respond, I swore and dialed Olivia, ignoring my sister’s glare. I’ll deal with my unladylike behavior later. We came to a point where we could just about see Olivia’s hunched over back. “Do you see them?” I asked as soon as she picked up, again putting the phone on loudspeaker for everyone to give input. I heard the crackling of the wind as I heard Olivia speak. “Gonna pass them in a minute!” Marina didn’t take her eyes off the road, as she gripped the steering wheel. “Tell Mirai to head towards the fields! We’ll try to run them off the road! The corn should break their fall, somewhat.” she yelled loud enough for Olivia to hear. We heard the scratching noise of skates making quick contact with pavement. I looked up to see Olivia’s back disappear. I leaned forward to get a better look, my hand finding the back of Marina’s chair, resting it on the empty space, phone still on loudspeaker, now nearer to Marina, the driver. I felt another hand come around my free hand and grip it tightly. I looked back and saw Belgium, giving me a determined look. I gave her a nervous smile, before turning back to the road in front of us. A voice crackled suddenly, making us all jump slightly. “MIRAI, FIELDS!” we heard Olivia yell. “OK!” I heard Mirai answer her, followed by rushed instructions to her brother, who was steering the scooter. We heard Japan yell out a somewhat shaky confirmation. The scratching sound intensified, indicating Olivia was rushing ahead to the crossroads. She breathed heavily before speaking. “Miss Betty, now.” Was the only thing she could manage out. “Okay, Olly! Leave it to us!” Marina said. A grunt was heard before we heard the distant revving of engines. 

In just a few minutes, the truck actually managed to catch up to the duo, who briefly looked back before turning their attention to the road. The crossroads were coming up, and on the left and right, on all four lanes, the cars piled behind each other. Distant honking was heard as Miss Betty stood straight right in the middle of the intersection, warning signs up and whistle blasting as loudly as her lungs could handle. I couldn’t see Olivia, but she was probably okay, probably just standing nearer to the sidewalk than the road, possibly to avoid getting hit by either the scooter or Marina’s truck. The scooter zoomed past the intersection safely and so did we. I looked back to see Olivia skate a little ways behind us, trying to catch up to us. And in the distance Miss Betty had let cars go back to usual business, no doubt staring straight at the mess that was Mirai and Japan on an un-brakeable scooter. “Ok now what?” I asked. Marina briefly looked back at me before asking. “Does she care about the scooter that much? She could just jump to the side with Japan and land in the corn fields and just have the thing get stopped naturally by hitting the ground.” I huffed before responding. “She stole it back from Buchanan as revenge, so yes! She’d like to keep it intact as much as possible.” Marina grumbled something about her being able to make another one herself, but I just rolled my eyes in response. “Letting it get destroyed isn’t an option, and neither is getting it in the fields. That’s even more property damage that we can handle right now.”

“True. Mr. Smith was livid with the S.S Waffle, what more this disaster?”

“I could just stop it myself.” America piped up. I turned to him, ignoring the whiplash I felt in my neck. “Are you insane?” I yelled at him. Spain placed a hand on my other shoulder and I turned to him with a questioning look. “Nina, I suggest you trust America with this one!” he said. I turned to Belgium, who surprisingly winked at me as a response. “Emilie, we nations can handle this! We’re tougher than we look!” Wordlessly, I sat back in disbelief as America pumped his fist, who took my silence at this moment as confirmation. “Heck yeah dude! Hey Marina! Get us in front of them.” he said, placing a hand on Marina’s shoulder, shaking it slightly. I could have sworn I saw Spain smirk. But I was too focused rolling my eyes to the high heavens as Marina swooned slightly from America’s touch, ears red with embarrassment. Though, kudos to her she managed to say something to me.

“Dial Mirai.”

“On it.” I said as I redialed Mirai on my phone and thankfully she answered this time. “WHAT DO I DO?” she yelled. “We’ll get in front of you, and at the very second you get the opportunity, jump!” She hung up the phone, and Marina pressed the gas down to the floor. We sped past them and at a considerable distance, then Marina hit the brakes. Belgium and I held unto each other, so as to not let one or the other fly through the front window. Spain griped the seatbelt as the car screeched to a sideways halt. Everyone lurched forward, but thankfully no one was thrown out and about. As soon as the car had come to a full stop, America threw open the passenger door and clambered out. He put himself between the truck and the scooter, arms to his side and chest out, eyes squinting to a focus. I reached over my sister to quickly get out. We both clambered out on one side while Spain was already standing near the back of the truck, shielding his eyes from the overhead sun to watch the scooter come closer and closer. Marina came around the front of the truck and next to me, one hand landing on my shoulder and the other gripping my free hand. I took her hand gratefully. Belgium gripped my other free hand as we watched anxiously, feeling somewhat helpless that we could not do anything at this point. From here, we could make out Mirai and Japan’s faces, who looked at us in shock. They waved their free hands, gesturing for us to get out of the way, their mouths moving to form words, but we couldn’t make anything out. Marina and I waved back at them, pointing to their right, where the corn fields were coming up. They briefly looked to the side, looked at each other and then finally nodded. Japan did a full turn, grabbed Mirai’s shoulders and jumped from the fast approaching vehicle. As soon as they were both off, America broke into a run to intercept the scooter. He reached the front of the scooter and immediately grabbed the handlebars to stop it. The speed that it had been going had slightly overpowered America’s charge as he toppled over, as if someone had clotheslined him, lying on his back, glasses askew but, thankfully, holding unto the handlebars. The mechanisms in the motor whirled sporadically before eventually sputtering out. He breathed a sigh of relief before trying to sit up. Marina had thankfully been there to lend him a helping hand to recollect himself and to right the scooter, while Spain had run ahead to check on the two that had thrown themselves into the field. Olivia had finally caught up to the scene and was already helping Mirai up, brushing dirt and foliage off her. From what I could tell, she seemed to be chewing Mirai out and gesturing to all of her. When she was finished, Mirai pointed an accusing finger at Olivia and she blushed as a response, equally embarrassed from her appearance. I breathed a sigh of relief, the whole fiasco over. I looked over to my sister and said. “Sorry, this wasn’t exactly the prime tv reunion you wanted.” She looked at me and laughed. “Are you kidding! You guys are so much fun!” 

“Trust us, Miss Belgium, we don’t do this everyday. Thank god, I don’t think I can handle this much stress, whoo...” Marina said, one hand holding unto the scooter. Beside her, America dusted himself off, hands in his pockets. He was facing the direction of Olivia, who was approaching with Mirai, Japan and Spain in tow. Thankfully, Olivia didn’t seem so mad about the fiasco, as she had one arm wrapped around Mirai’s shoulders, laughing about something. As they approached, Mirai caught my eye and I looked at her accusingly. She laughed nervously and shrugged. “Uh...malfunction?” 

“Clearly!” I exclaimed, tapping my foot. “Oh, you’re lucky there’s natural cushioning everywhere, or it would have been S.S Waffle all over again!” Mirai winced at that. I still had a mark on my knee from that incident, and Mirai clearly remembered how I got that. “I’ll make it up to you, I swear!”

“You better! With the heart attack you gave us!” Olivia gave a sigh of relief. “Let’s just, go back home. I’m starving.” Everyone gave some form of agreement and we all piled into the red truck. We let the shaken Japan and Mirai into the passenger seats, certain they didn’t want to be riding in the trunk outside. Olivia and I laid out the tarp to cover the floor of the truck and sat down, cross-legged. America let Spain sit in the passenger seat to be next to Marina. He closed the door for him and clambered into the back, taking his place in the back with us, facing Olivia, next to the back door. For good measure, he held unto the back door to prevent it from opening whilst the car was in motion. He had also graciously dragged the scooter to the back and laid it in the middle of the trunk. Belgium, after much argument with Japan, sat next to me and Olivia, sitting down with a huff. “Honestly, I told Japan I was going to be okay back here!” I shrugged. “Well, I’m guessing he doesn’t want another incident.” “He wouldn’t hear the end of it from your brother.” America added. Belgium groaned slightly. The car went into motion, and Belgium let her head fall back slightly, sighing. “Well, that was an eventful morning. Certainly one that Japan didn’t expect.” She giggled slightly, peering into the back window. A lively conversation was occurring inside. Unfortunately, we couldn’t hear much, nor discern much from their facial expressions. Marina seemed to be gushing about something to Spain, who was giving her a thumbs up, grinning broadly. Mirai and Japan were having their own conversation, perhaps comforting him. She sat closer to him whispering. Japan was nodding, eyebrows still knit together, hair slightly askew and filled with stray leaves. She picked one off him, and he sighed. Her response was to pat him on the back, lips moving. He perked up at something she said and seemed to relax, whilst she giggled. They got closer in such a short time, huh. Didn’t peg Mirai to be like that, but I suppose that’s for the best, and honestly Mirai is the friendliest out of all of us in the group, so it isn’t a surprise really. I turned my attention to my sister, Olivia and America. 

Our own conversation went under way, as Olivia asked what Mirai and I had done. I told her Mirai’s plan for Buchanan and all his transgressions. By the end of it I was kind of nervous. She and Buchanan were on the same baseball team for our school. The team is a mixed baseball team because our school’s population was too small to make two separate teams, and since we needed a team, the motion to mix girls and boys to form one team was ok’d. Buchanan was technically listed the team captain, people voted on him, however, once he was voted into that position, he used it for other things, and all-in-all ditched most practices but made sure to show up to the games to “steal the thunder”, as Olivia put it. Olivia was the vice-captain, but regarded by most on the team as the captain who actually got shit done. Because of this, she and Buchanan got into fights a lot. Their rivalry had been going on since we were in the 4th grade, that officially ended when Buchanan nearly took a metal bat to the face, and his mother reported Olivia to the school board. A whole thing ensued, and in the end, her and Buchanan just shook hands and promised to never fight each other physically again. Though that agreement didn’t exclude verbal harassment and online bullying. Olivia ignored most of it, though she butt heads with Buchanan over practice. If there’s one thing that Olivia hates more than being late, it’s missing appointments when you’ve arranged it ahead of time already. I told her what we both did in addition to the glitter box, and she sighed, though she smiled while she said it, she scolded us lightly. “I appreciate the sentiment guys, I just hope you don’t get sued for it, or something like that.” I shook my head. “Not possible. His mom’s gonna be preoccupied by something else concerning her son for quite a while.” Olivia sniggered, and America seemed to join it. “Man, I’m kinda jealous that you have this kind thing going on.” She looked at him, giving him a questioning glance. “The prank thing?” I slapped my head. “Honestly Olivia, I think he means us.” I said, gesturing to us. Olivia pouted. “Well sorry! Didn’t know what you meant!”

“Clearly! Sometimes Olivia, it’s lucky we’re your friends or else someone would’ve taken advantage of you already!” She looked at me with furrowing brows. “I...Thank you?” she said questioningly, not really knowing what to say. I groaned. “My dear, you’ve already thanked us!” She perked up smiling. “Oh! Eheheh! I must’ve forgotten! I’ll just thank you again!” She smiled at me broadly. I sighed heavily, rubbing my eyes in irritation. I glared at her, nevertheless, a smile forming on my lips. “How are you the the smartest, yet the stupidest person, I know?” I asked. When I got a mere shrug, I chuckled. Reaching over, I pinched her sides. She protested, asking me why, whilst I heard Belgium to my right chuckle light-heartedly. This went on for a few minutes before she shifted her position to be right next to the door and hold unto it, like what America was doing. She huffed at me. “Stop that!” she protested. And in response I started kicking her lightly. “You’re such a clueless person, I swear! How infuriating!” 

“I wouldn’t be, if you guys told me!”

“But where’s the fun in that?”

“I don’t know!” she threw up her hands in frustration. America had to duck slightly to miss being smacked in the face. Olivia didn’t seem to notice, nor did America seem to are for her lack of spatial awareness. She continued with the banter. “Honestly, you guys make fun of me in distress.” 

“Because it’s fun!”

“So? It doesn’t solve anything!”

“Honestly, it solves everything!”

“For you guys! To me it just makes me...grrrr!” Unable to express the feeling she had, she waved her fists in front of her, stomping her feet in the process. I burst out laughing, as did Belgium and America. I stuck out a foot to poke her more but I accidentally kicked one of my flip flops off. She caught it before it fell out of the moving truck. We all gave each other looks of shock before a loud banging noise brought us out of our reverie. We turned to the window where Mirai pulled her hand away from the glass and gave us a “what the fuck” look. Apparently, Marina saw a shoe fly out and asked Mirai to check up on us. I looked at Olivia and as soon as we made eye contact, we could hardly contain our laughter. Through tears, Mirai looked at us as if we were crazy and turned to Marina, twirling a finger near her head in a circle pattern. Marina looked back briefly before shrugging, fully done with our shit. 

“Don’t do that!” Olivia shouted at me, and I just laughed in response. She sighed, but continued to laugh. The backseat descended into laughing madness, which continued even as we arrived at Olivia’s home.

Mirai, miraculously, wasn’t chewed out too much for the incident. Her sister had heard it because Officer Betty came to her door to report the incident to her, Mirai’s legal guardian, on paper that is. Lilian was mad at first, thinking Miria acted alone, but when Mirai explained it to her, she only got a light scolding, another reminder on the S.S Waffle incident and all was forgiven. People got cleaned up, pizza was ordered and the game was put on, where no one was really paying attention to it, except for Olivia, who every now and again would not engage in any human interaction and instead watched the game. When her team made a pitch she made a tiny fist bump in the air, and when they didn’t she moped around silently for a few seconds before talking to us again. We were all eating around the coffee table, as the dining table was where our parents decided to have their own lunch get together, with a few quips from them every now and again, and of course the occasional question. I’m surprised that the adults are able to get along so well, given that we were technically missions. They didn’t have to get along together, nor did they even have to interact. But in fact, when the girls and I first met, our parents encouraged our interactions. Nevertheless, I’m thankful that they let us be friends naturally. 

Belgium nudged me, because I was caught staring at Olivia and America, again, and then turned back to her conversation with Japan about training plans, both physical and mental training, which I wasn’t too thrilled for, so I tuned her out for a bit. Olivia seemed so far from America, with Olivia on the ground next to the coffee table, and America near the center of the couch. Occupying the spots beside him were Spain and Marina. All three of them were engaging in a lively conversation, but every once in a while America would glance over to Olivia and then join back into a conversation with the two. Not sure if it was because of America’s mistake that caused her to break or lose (one of the two, Olivia couldn’t really confirm and she did not want to try to salvage them) the barrettes we got her for her 16th birthday or the fact that she still can’t talk properly to him, either way starting up conversations between the two did not seem to be going well. Mirai and I were standing with Japan and Belgium at the corner next to the door in the living room, holding our pizza plates and eating standing up. There was ample seating, but it felt better to stand for the time being. I turned away from them and sighed. Mirai patted my shoulder, and leaned closer to me. “You know I don’t know whether to consider Marina at this moment as incredibly selfish or incredibly ballsy.” she whispered. I looked at her incredulously. “Right!” I exclaimed as softly as I could so as not to alert the others. To be fair, the room was pretty loud, with many different conversations happening, plus this was an open floor plan, the dining area and the living room were not separated with anything. “Her intentions are like super sketchy right now.” I stated. Mirai nodded in agreement. 

“Should we do something?”

“You mean trying to take away meat from a lioness? You’re kidding.”

“It’s an option.”

“Another option is to probably just leave the two be.” Belgium butt in. I gave her a look of surprise, and in return, she winked back. “Hey, sorry to butt in, but I can’t help but hear you from here.” I shook my head, holding up a hand. “To be honest you are right, sister. Besides, I only know Olivia. Funnily enough, I don’t know that America fellow all too well anyway, so I don’t know what he’s really like, or what he wants to do when it comes to getting closer to Olivia.” Japan hummed a response to me. He turned to me and regarded me with a quiet smile, which reminded me a lot like Mirai’s calm smile when she fights against the boys in our school over Tekken. “If I heard correctly, America-san has made quite an impression on New York-san...Olivia-san...yes?” I nodded, adding that he could probably use whichever name was more comfortable for him. He nodded, putting the mental note in his head as he continued. “America-san has certain, ah, unique traits about him, which includes his loud nature. But I can assure you that he’s not always like that. I am friends with him, you see.” Mirai seemed surprised. “Really?” she asked her brother, who nodded, still smiling. He closed his eyes and tilted his head upwards, as if reminiscing about something. 

“Ah, of course America-san was really rowdy when we first met. Even when he visited on his own without the company of England-san, he liked to do things his own way, and had really peculiar tastes. In the end though, we worked a lot of things out, like his weird dancing rituals. We enjoy a lot of things together, and sometimes we just read manga or play games in silence.”

I felt genuinely impressed that someone like Japan was friends with America, because their personalities were not at all congruent. Mirai was also impressed, but by a different thing. “Sorry, it’s great your friends and all, but nii-san, you play games?” she asked him. He seemed to be slightly embarrassed by her question, for he answered in a flustered manner. “Of course I do! I make games you know.” he murmured. Mirai giggled and gave him a thumbs up. “Oh, I don’t doubt you nii-san! Let me play against you some time! I’m up for any fighting game you choose!” At that statement, Japan’s eyes seemed to twinkle. His stance changed to something akin to a challenging stance. I felt the heat come off between the two as Japan said. “Let’s see who comes out victorious.”

“Bring it on. Hey, Olly!”

“Yesh?” a muffled reply came from Olivia’s mouth, having stuffed another slice of pizza in her mouth, not taking her eyes away from the tv screen. “Can I borrow your switch? I’m gonna play Smash with Japan-nii-san.” Mirai asked, approaching Olivia, but not getting in front of her. Olivia nodded and pointed to the console which was placed in one of the shelves that made up the underneath part of the tv console. Without getting into Olivia’s line of sight, she reached under and grabbed the switch, the stand and the charger. She motioned for Japan to come and sit on the couch next to her as she set up the switch to a standing position, plugging one end in the switch and then handing the charger to Japan who plugged the charger into the outlet on the ground near the other end of the couch. Belgium and I did not move from our standing position, as Spain moved closer to watch the match take place. Marina asked to switch positions with America, feigning interest in the game, seemingly to get more close to America, who obliged and scooted over to let Marina get between him and Spain. Though in her defense, she likes Smash as well, so that could be a reason. In the process of switching positions, she caught my eye and gave me a look. She looked worried for a second and gestured for the two of us to get closer. I held up my hand and shook my head. “Trust me, I don’t have much understanding in that game, and I had more questions than answers last time.” She shrugged, face switching from worried to content. “Fair point.” With that she turned back to Mirai and Japan, who had booted the game and were now in the process of choosing characters. 

I leaned back into the wall, and Belgium followed in suit, though I stood straight back up when she gasped dramatically. “Sister? What’s wrong?” I asked her. She turned to me and clasped my hands, eyes sparkling. “You know what would be good toppings? Blueberries covered in dark chocolate!” I felt my mouth water. That was a genius idea! I mean there were already acai berries in dark chocolate as snacks, imagine them as toppings! That would be amazing! “I better add that to my list.” I said, pulling out my phone. She got excited and attempted to look over my shoulder, but I obliged and showed her the screen of my phone, along with my digital notes on the toppings I’ve tried and the kinds of flour I’ve used to make waffle batter. Yes, I switched from being worried over my friend to being worried over toppings on waffles, but come on! This is important too, and besides, I’m not writing their story. I’m sure Olivia can handle it herself. 

Olivia’s POV

I cannot handle this.

I sighed silently, looking over my shoulder once again. As soon as my game had ended, Mirai had asked for my permission to play Splatoon with Marina on a bigger screen, which I obliged to clean up the dishes and put the trash away with Rose. Currently they were having a battle in one of the stages, and were against one another. Japan was whispering tips to Mirai and Spain was loudly cheering next to Marina, who was now sitting between Marina and America, who was shouting loudly about how he beat Japan in a battle once, to which the reply was an invitation for a rematch, which he accepted, a determined expression on his face. Belgium and Emilie occupied the armrest, just enjoying the noise and excitement, every once in a while coming up with new twists on classic desserts. I stared at my brother one more time, pushing the hair out of my face before continuing the washing up. It was now 2pm, and I’ve barely spoken to anyone in the room over, besides Emilie and her sister Belgium, who seemed pretty cool. I didn’t try to talk to Japan or Spain because they seemed to be having fun, so I didn’t want to interrupt. That only left America left for me to talk to but he was too focused on the game. I know that’s an excuse, but I got too nervous. Hence why I volunteered to wash the dishes and clean up while everyone else had fun. This isn’t my idea of fun, but I still felt pretty bad about this morning. 

Yes, I admit that it was my fault that I kinda messed up with the prank, but I couldn’t get a word out! America was rambling too much, and I choked up. I sighed again, this time heavily as I put the last dish in the dryer rack. Most of the adults had vacated the dining room in favor of smoking outside on the patio to escape the noise. Smart choice. I turned around and almost jumped seeing Rose holding a wine glass directly behind me. She motioned for me to come with a finger and I gingerly took a few steps to the left side in front of the fridge, out of eyesight. “Baby, I’m not gonna ask about how your morning went. Clearly wrong because you came back dirtier than when you come back from your games, and you’re absolutely filthy when you come back!” she exclaimed as quietly as she could. I rubbed the side of my arm, muttering. “Sorry, Rose.” She shook her head, strands of curly hair falling on her face. She looked like a commercial model. She reached a hand over to cup my face and I took it tiredly, but gratefully. “What’s wrong?” she asked me. I shrugged and looked at my friends. Rose followed my line of sight and huffed. “I know you can get along, you gotta try your best like you always do!”

“I know, but it’s just difficult! I dunno what to talk about first, and to begin with I don’t know where to start!”

“How about the baseball cards he gave you?” Rose suggested. When I was younger, as a way to get used to his presence I guess, he gave me packets of baseball trading cards as little presents and such when I did well at something, along with greeting cards or postal cards with famous American landmarks on them. Though most of the time, I couldn’t read most of the cards because the handwriting was horrible chicken scratch that even Rose couldn’t decipher. But I had to admit, what I could decipher in those cards were pretty funny, and honestly it said a lot about his personality, and I could see what he wrote down to be true in real life. In his cards, which he labeled himself as a distant relative twice removed on my mom’s side who lived in the Alaskan alps (seemed legit at the time, don’t judge me), he described himself and how much fun he had with his brother and his friends during meetings and casual get-togethers. Though, none of the people now seemed to fit the descriptions of his close friends, other than Japan, who he had clearly described in his letters as a “super chill dude who likes video games and is as close to always beating me but not really because I’m the hero and I win all the time! Well most of the time, I swear it’s, like, 39 percent of the time, and I win most of the time!”. The only one with short, wavy hair was Belgium and she was no French man with a goatee who always had smooth words. Neither was she a blonde Englishman with enormous eyebrows and an even bigger temper, she had brown hair. And the only brown-haired man was Spain, and he didn’t have long hair or looked like a girl!

When I found out he was my brother, I half expected him to arrive with such people, as he talked about being so close to them. But since he didn’t, I felt a little awkward talking to my friends with these people around as well. To say my comfort level had been exceeded is an understatement. I felt really small next to my brother. I expressed my worries to Rose who gave me a big hug. “Hrk! Rose...suffocating...” She shushed me, telling me to be quiet. “Olivia, listen to me.” She said as she pulled away, hands on my shoulders. “I can’t give much advice to you on how to deal with this, but I do know this. You can talk to your brother about anything. Anything at all, baby girl. Just try.” she stated, giving me a gentile expression. I hummed, thinking hard about what to really do. She sighed, rubbing my shoulders before pulling away. She walked away to let me think about my game plan, before stopping short and coming up to me again. I gave her a questioning look and she just chuckled. “I forgot I had a date today! I’m leaving the house to you, ok? Show America to his room, ok?” I must have visibly paled, because Rose quickly followed her statement with a “Don’t worry too much! You worry too much. Relax.'' She coaxed me to breathe slowly and to face my fears, and then she left me pondering in the kitchen.

She was right, but I still couldn’t figure out how to approach him properly. I suppose I could talk to him about baseball or...cool stuff. ‘Crap!’ I thought to myself, shaking my head. I don’t have a clue about most boys my age, let alone older men who are probably older than time itself! Am I supposed to be talking like myself? I mean, maybe? I peered from the doorframe at my friends, a little jealous they were having fun and laughing while I was being stupid. I mean, why am I having a hard time anyway? This is dumb, why do I care so much. I ducked back into the kitchen, screwing my eyes shut. After a few minutes of more slow breathing, I figured out the answer to my own question.

I’m afraid of being rejected.

I felt my eyes water and I resisted the urge to cry. ‘Dammit not now.’ I told myself, rubbing my eyes from underneath my glasses. Rejection alone is bad enough, but when you’re in a student population of only a thousand kids with problems of their own, it tends to hit you pretty hard. So yes, it’s pretty stupid but I’m afraid of my own brother rejecting me, but for what? Because I’m weird? This whole situation is weird and I just need to get myself together or else-

“Hey where’s the bathroom- you ok?” 

I snapped out of my reverie to look right up into my brother’s own blue eyes staring back down at me, a worried expression written on my face. I stuttered a bit before leading him to the restroom. He thanked me and entered, shutting the door behind him. I leaned back against the wall next to the door. Something compelled me to stay. Maybe because I wanted to try to talk to him without anyone around to hear me, or maybe it’s because the guest room was right in front of the bathroom. I sighed and then promptly jolted because I heard the toilet flush. I steeled myself and I tried to smile, but I failed because I felt my smile shake, so I dropped it, and opted for a neutral expression instead. America exited the bathroom and was surprised to see me still standing there, though he had a weird way of expressing it. “Oh dude! You’re still here, man I thought you left already to join the others!” he smiled brightly, and I felt my armpits perspire. Does he want me to preoccupy myself or to talk to him? I have no clue! “Uh...mhm.” I just nodded. I side stepped a bit before saying. “Oh, uh, Rose said you’ll be staying here?” I said. He beamed at me. “Heck yeah I am! I offered Mattie to room with me but he said that might be overstepping your boundaries and stuff. So he’ll stay in a hotel. Sorry to tell you that, I’ll pass the message to Rose. Where is she? Is she in her room?” He asked, talking rapidly. Nervously, I looked up at him, brushing my hair out of my face. He looked down at me, still beaming happily at me, eyes shining bright blue. He looked really genuine. “Uh, I think so. She had a date tonight, so she must be getting ready for it.” I said. America whistled, leaning sideways against the bathroom door.”Wow! A date! Sounds pretty cool! You know who it is?” he asked me. I leaned on the wall adjacent to him, crossing my arms and pondering on it. After a minute I told him. “Might be the librarian at school. I think he’s French or something. Don’t remember his name.” In response to that, he snorted. “Oh boy, a French date, huh? You know where they’re going?” I shook my head, and he laughed, which was hearty, from the belly kind of sound. The kind that grandfathers have. “You know I know France! And knowing him, I’m betting all my burgers on that place that I sent the ladies to yesterday.” I nodded. 

“You think that’s where they’re going? That expensive place?”

“Uh, yeah! I mean where else would he take her?”

“What do you think? Where would you take Rose, hypothetically I mean?”

“Oh definitely the coolest burger joint in town! Like a local place.”

“There’s a local place around here that has great burgers. It’s apparently popular with couples.”

“Oh sweet! Let’s go there with Mattie when he gets here!”

“Huh? All three of us?”

“Duh! Who else would I bring?”

“Uh, your girlfriend?”

“Don’t have one!”

“Oh.” I paused for a moment. Initially I wanted to find out if he was single or not, but now that I know, I’m at a lost for words. Thankfully, America filled the silence. “Did you think I had one?” he asked. He gasped at something putting a hand up to cover his mouth. “Do you think your big brother is handsome? Aw, man! You shouldn’t have!” I turned away, a bit embarrassed. I debated telling him that I wanted to know if he was single for personal reasons, but instead I seemed to have embarrassed myself instead. To redirect his poking and prodding, I said. “I’ve read your letters.” He laughed at me, which surprised me. “I’m surprised you could!” he said. I snorted a bit before giggling and in response he grinned. “I mean, I looked back on them ‘cause Rose sent me pictures of what I wrote and I hate to admit that Iggy is right! My handwriting is kinda total shit! God, I’m embarrassed I sent you those!” I let myself giggle. I grinned at him. “Did you write them on the way to the post office?”

“Nah, I wrote them while Iggy was lecturing me in a meeting. He tried pulling the card away from me but I fought him back for it.”

“Who’s Iggy?”

“Oh, it’s the nickname I gave England. I didn’t mention it?”

“If you did, I couldn’t read it.” I couldn’t contain myself and I let myself laugh from my remark, accidentally snorting in the process. I felt myself turn red and hot for a second. “Hahah, that was pretty cute!” I pouted slightly at him, still red in the face. “Don’t tell my friends I did that. Or I won’t hear the end of it.” I said.

“Tease you relentlessly?”

“Yup.” I deadpanned, shifting my weight to lean more comfortably against the wall. He chuckled and reached over to pat me on the shoulder. He put a finger to his lips and said in a hushed whisper. “Sibling secret!” I grinned and imitated his gesture, to which she grinned widely. I brushed the strands of my hair out of my face. He noticed it and a sorry expression crossed his face. “Sorry about the hair clips.” I looked at him and shrugged, smiling sadly. “Better than going back for them.” He leaned back as a response, also crossing his arms. “Is that dude always like that? Like, trigger happy and stuff?” he waved his arms to emphasize his point. I shrugged. “Nah. He usually yells at kids to just get off of his property. I wasn’t expecting him to pull a gun out at us.”  
“Right!? Man that was insane!” he exclaimed, sighing heavily. A moment of silence passed between us before I remembered what I was supposed to say. ‘Huh,’ I thought to myself. ‘This is going pretty well.’

“By the way, you’ll be staying in this room.” I said gesturing to the door to my left. He perked up and straightened himself out. I did the same and I jiggled the door knob. When the door didn’t budge, I excused myself and quickly went to a drawer in the kitchen to grab the master keys. I could hear the sounds of Smash ringing out, along with slight cursing. I peered out into the living room to see what was going on. Marina, Spain, Mirai and Japan seemed to be doing a four way brawl as Inkling, Samus, Bayonetta and the Dragon Quest 9 hero, respectively. It was unclear who was winning but the look on Marina’s face gave it away. Clearly it wasn’t her. I turned around to walk back into the hallway where America still stood waiting for me. He beamed when he saw me and I hurried to open the door. It creaked when I pushed it open and turned on the lights. I was surprised to see a fairly clean, but empty room. I left the door open as he and I walked into the room. “This’ll be okay right?” I turned to him and he was already sitting on the bed, bouncing up and down. He looked up at me and grinned, patting an empty spot next to him. I gingerly took the spot next to him, and in the process kicked my feet under the bed. Yelping a bit in shock, I jumped back on my feet when I felt something hard pass my toes. America also jumped up, the look on his face of pure fear and panic. “Dude! What’s wrong? Is there a ghost?”

“Something touched me!” I said, shivering a bit. I got on my hands and knees and inspected the underside of the bed. I gasped and stuck my hand underneath before pulling out a battered wooden bat. I held it up against the light to inspect it. It was badly chipped and scrapped. The paint was fully scraped off and the head part of the bat was slightly splintered. “Aw, man! I haven’t seen this in a while!” I exclaimed, pulling myself up and on the bed. America plopped himself next to me, leaning over slightly to see the bat in my hand. “Rose got me this after I played in my first game! Wonder what it was doing underneath the bed?” I pondered. I looked over at America and watched his eyes dart from the bat to me. I silently handed him the bat and he inspected it, feeling over the splintered wood. I half expected him to cry out in pain over a splinter, but surprisingly he didn’t get one. “How many games wore this thing out?” He asked me, grinning. I rubbed the back of my head sheepishly, avoiding eye contact with him. “Oh, I didn’t play much back then. I do now though!” I said, quickly adding the last part. He looked at me in confusion, so I provided the explanation. 

“Back then, I was the only girl my age to be interested in baseball. We had a little league baseball team that consisted of all boys, and I was the only girl who could play besides some kid’s little sister who was the water cooler girl. They didn’t let me play because the team from two counties away, back when Olio was only a hundred people, were notorious for picking fights and beating our team, so they didn’t want to subject me to that. Instead, I just practiced with the coach after matches. Though a year later, I convinced them to let me play and I won.” 

“Did-did the other team pick a fight.”

“Sure did!”

“And what happened?” I pointed to the bat and looked him square in the face. “That happened.” When he paled slightly I rushed to explain that the splinters were caused by me throwing the bat to the ground. Because the bat was made from a slightly less desirable material used in making good wooden bats, it got weakened from one year of constant use, wear and tear. Believing my bat to be my good luck charm, I used it in the game. I hit the ball on the first try and I raced around the bases, bat still in hand. Rose told me that the boys from the away team thought I was going to slug them over the head if they tried to prevent me from reaching the bases like they would normally do for the boys on our team, so they steered clear from me as I passed them by. They further distanced themselves away from me when I had passed the home base and threw my bat down as a celebratory act. The bat splintered upon impact on the ground with a deafening crunch, but no one on our team paid any heed as we had won the game. I heard America sigh with relief. “Dude, don’t scare me like that! I thought I had to deal with a violent streak in you. I already have one dude like that on my team.” I looked at him pondering whom he meant, racking my brain to figure it out in his letters. “Uh, some dude called Ivan?” He sighed. “Yeah, that’s the one. Seriously that guy comes off sometimes as scary, but he doesn’t know it. Even comes in sometimes waving a lead pipe! Seriously. Good thing you aren’t doing that!”

“Well I did hit a kid once with a metal bat...”

“You did what?!”

I told him the story of Marty Buchanan and his Karen of a mom and how she reported on me because I slugged Marty in the face with my bat for nearly snapping off my bra during a practice game. Granted it was a sports bra, but it really hurt when he kept twanging it. I kept quiet in the first few attempts as we waited in line for our turn to bat, but the final one he had grabbed it with his whole hand through my shirt and not just two fingers and nearly ripped it from my body. That’s when I turned around and slugged him. And he’s had a missing tooth ever since. When we got home, Rose had to promise to just buy me a new bra because the strap to the one I was wearing was hanging by a single thread, one of the two clasps were missing, and the hooks to the clasps were bent out of shape. When I finished retelling the story, America looked like he actually wanted to slug Buchanan myself, but I told him that revenge has been served in my stead. “Good thing too. Or else I would have to handle him myself!” I snorted. “If I’d have let you do that, he probably wouldn’t recover. You were able to stop a runaway scooter with bare hands. Granted it’s not impressive on paper, but it was going pretty fast.” “I mean sure, I fell on my back, but hey, I’m pretty great!” He said, flexing. I nodded, smiling. 

A knock on the door brought us out of our conversation. I saw Marina standing by the door sheepishly smiling. “Oh hey!” I exclaimed, jumping up from the bed. America still sat back on the bed, grinning up at me and Marina. “Sorry, I got caught up in stuff.” Marina waved her hand, leaning against the doorframe. “I was wondering where you two went off. The others are looking at your Nintendo app thing. The one with the retro games in it? I got bored when Mirai and Japan started geeking out on it, and Emilie was interested in playing it. Belgium is reading your cookbooks next to her. So there’s that. And Spain got a phone call that he said was “personal”, whatever that means.” she said, airing quotation marks. She flipped her hair and I was tempted to see if my brother was paying attention, but I didn’t want to give anything away. Marina noticed the bat and smiled. “Oh man, that old thing?” I glanced over to the bat, and then grinned back at her. “Yeah! Found it in here ‘cause America is staying in this room while he’s here.” I wished I was just as smooth as Marina when it came to concealing her crushes because she always did so really smoothly. She twirled her hair, smiling slightly. “Oh really? Is he staying for your game as well?” she asked. America perked up. “What game?” Marina answered for me. “You didn’t know? Olivia’s on the baseball team. Friday will be the last game of the season and she’s playing in it.” He jumped up to shake my shoulders. I turned to face him slightly to look at his face. He had an expression of pure excitement on it. “For real! Wow! I have such great timing. Take that England! Serves you right for telling me that staying here for a week wasn’t a good idea!” he laughed, seemingly congratulating himself for a job well done. I chuckled, embarrassed by the revelation, but nonetheless I felt my chest heat up with pride. “Not only on Friday, but there’s Thursday as well. That’s club day, and all of the families will be there. Most clubs, including some sports clubs and the cheer squad will be doing some sort of performance. You should come with Canada.” I suggested. He grinned, keeping a hand on my shoulder. “Well, duh! We’ll be there! Wohoo!” he said, pumping his fists into the air excitedly. I could have sworn I heard Marina sigh, dreamily but when I turned to look at her, she had the same stance and smile as I had seen before. Again, if only I knew her ways.

“Oh, yeah. I came to find you because of the notes?” Marina said, leaning off the wall, and putting her hands on her hips, winking at me. I nodded, rolling my eyes, but grinning, nonetheless. She was playing the “I need your notes” card. Really, she may or may not need it but it was the more subtle version of the ever popular “Come with me to the bathroom”, where girls would talk about boys and other stuff. Though I usually don’t talk about those kinds of things with my friends like this, I could make an exception. I excused myself, and after promising America that we would talk more, I went with Marina to my bedroom, passing through the living room. Currently, Emilie was playing Zelda: A Link to the Past. She seemed to be enjoying it, as she was casually cracking her puns, while Mirai was laughing. I checked in on them, and once I confirmed that they were all good, I took Marina upstairs to my bedroom and closed the door. “So, do you want my actual notes or do you have news?” She grinned, sitting on my bed. “Both, actually.” I sighed, but in a good-natured kind of way. I grabbed my notes from off my desk and handed them to Marina, who proceeded to take pictures of them, whilst gushing about my brother. 

We ended up talking in my room until 3pm, until we heard a knock on my door. I opened the door to see Emilie and Mirai at the doorway. I let them in. “We were wondering where you two went. Thankfully America told us where you went.” Emilie said, crossing her arms and giving us a look. Mirai grinned and laid herself across my bed. “Man, your bed is comfortable.” 

“Well, you can stay on it, just don’t put your feet up.” Mirai gave me a thumbs up as her response. Emilie went towards my desk and sat on the chair there. I took my spot beside Marina, the place on my bed closest to the door. “Note sharing?” Emilie asked, taking a look at the notes Marina had opened up. “Yup. What are the others doing by the way?” I asked. 

“Oh, when we said that we were going up, they said that they were calling home to tell the other people that they were okay and stuff. Y’know, checking in, all that.”

“Oh, ok. You didn’t get a video call or..?”

“Nah, they kind of didn’t want to do that. Guess they want our interaction to be authentic and stuff.” Mirai quipped in, while Emilie nodded, surveying all the notes I had open on my desk. “That seems fair. Uh... What do you guys think of them?” Marina grinned. “Exactly like me.” Emilie snorted. “Obviously. We could all see that from a mile away.”

“Well hey, what about you?”

“Well...yeah, like me.”

“So what’s the issue?”

“Nothing! I’m just saying.” Emilie defended herself. Mirai laughed, sitting back up. “You guys talked so much about pastries, I thought I would get cavities from listening to you two.” Emilie puffed up her cheeks, waving her hands trying to swat at Mirai. “Hey! I’ll have you know that those were VERY important conversations we were having.” Mirai laughed some more. “I know, but still!” She then laid back down, blowing strands of hair from her face. “I thought Japan-nii-san was gonna be hard to talk to. Turns out, it’s easier than expected.”

“Hey, you’re already calling Japan “brother”?”

“Is there anything wrong with it?”

“No! I call Belgium “sister” and Marina-”

“I call Spain “hermano”...actually Olivia you haven’t done that stuff.” They all turned to be and I rubbed the back of my neck in embarrassment. “Yeah, I, uh, still haven’t done that.” Emilie leaned forward, eyebrows knit together in concern. “What’s wrong? Is he giving you trouble?” I shook my head, leaning back. “No, no! Nothing like that! We’ve progressed somewhat in the conversation department, but I’m just a little nervous. I’ll get comfortable, really.” Marina slapped my back. “Good! I won’t have a chance otherwise.” Emilie snorted, leaning back on the chair. “Pretty conniving of you to use Olivia to get to her brother, Marina.” she said to Marina, who gasped dramatically. “How dare you accuse me of doing that! I’m helping him too y’know! In getting close to Olivia, that is.”

“I know, I can hear it, but still! Pretty shameful, if you ask me!”

“It is not shameful!”

“Does Marina even have shame?” Mirai asked. Before anyone answered I shot back. “Do you think she knows the meaning of it?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Emilie!”

“What?”

“Don’t do me dirty like that!” Marina pouted, causing us to all laugh. “In any case,” I started. “There are plenty of chances to get close. We have the club day and prom night, since we aren’t doing anything that night.” Emilie huffed. “Well, duh. Honestly, why are we helping again?”

“Because we aren’t going, and paying our fees “wasn’t enough”. So we have to help.” Marina answered. “Ugh! I’m annoyed again!” Emilie stamped her foot on the floor. Mirai suddenly shot up, grabbing her phone from her back pocket. Marina and I nearly shot up from our places ourselves in surprise. “What is it? What’s wrong?” Emilie asked us. “The videos are in! I’ll send you guys a copy!” Mirai said, giggling. We looked at each other and grinned. “So you were able to hack into the street cams, huh?” I said, to which Mirai gave me a thumbs up. “Yup! Sorry it took a while to download and save, but the reactions should be a good compensation, yes?” Marina leaned on her arms, still standing. “Um, yes?! Give me Charlotte’s, stat!”

“Okay! Chill! I got her feed right here.”

“We could just hook up your laptop to the tv to view the feed.” I suggested. “Oh, good idea.” Mirai said, sliding off the bed and exiting my room, followed swiftly by Marina, excited by the promise of Charlotte getting her overdue comeuppance. I jerked my head toward the open door, and Emilie smiled up at me. “You’ll be happy to know that there’s feed in Marty’s treehouse as well. I got Mirai to help me with that stuff ‘cause I have no idea how to do that.” She said, wiggling her fingers. I giggled. “What did I deserve to have you guys as friends?” I said. “Well, I guess it was just a matter of coincidence, really.” she said. I chuckled. “Well, either by coincidence or something else, I’m real lucky to have best friends like you guys. I sure do love you guys for all the things you’ve done for me, even if I didn’t ask for it.” Emilie’s eyes widened in surprise, but the cheshire grin on her face said she had other plans. She moved to pull out her phone and I held up my hands. “Oh no..” I warned her. She just cackled, ignoring my heed. “Could you repeat that Olly?”

“Not on your life!”

“C’mon please? Just once so that we could hear it?”

“No!”

“C’mon! Don’t be so difficult! Just admit it!”

Well, if I’m to live forever, I guess these are the kinds of things that I have to just deal with. I just hope America and Canada aren’t like this. 

“Girls! Olly said something sweet!”

“No way!”

“Arggh! Don’t say it so loud, Emi!”

“Wait, pause the video, we gotta make this happen!”

“No one is making nothing happen! Just play the video!”

I think I can survive the craziness. 

Hopefully.


End file.
